


Make No Mistake

by dickyang, vageege



Category: One Piece
Genre: Alternate Uni, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Gen, M/M, Multi, Recreational Drug Use, and people are bad at emotions, cuties being cute, idiots being dumb, nobody in the world knows what being an adult actually is
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-05-10
Updated: 2015-06-14
Packaged: 2018-01-24 05:08:23
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 182,528
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1592732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dickyang/pseuds/dickyang, https://archiveofourown.org/users/vageege/pseuds/vageege
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>College AU. This is an account of a series of events poorly defined as the best days of their lives. Zosan/Frobin+</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. August

Sanji clenched his fist around the ten dollar bill in his pocket as he walked to a seedier part of town—a part of town completely unfit for a kid his age to be wandering around in. He kept his eyes peeled, searching down alleys and side-streets.  

 

He'd worked very hard for that ten dollars. It was bullshit, that being all he had, but he'd work harder. Every day. He had finally convinced that shitty old man to actually pay him for all the work he did in that stupid restaurant. The Baratie. Ugh. He'd scrubbed so many dishes that his hands felt raw. 

 

It'd taken him nearly a year to convince Zeff to not only let him work in the restaurant, but to compensate him for his time. It probably wouldn't have taken him so long if he could speak the fucking language when he first got there. 

 

He remembered trying to get Zeff to actually let him cook. That hadn't gone well. But it'd had its small victories. Extremely small. 

 

Zeff had walked into the small apartment they shared and found Sanji standing atop one of the counters, digging into the cabinets overhead to find another frying pan. He was caught red-handed. 

 

"What the hell d'you think you're doing, brat!" Zeff had barked at him, and Sanji had spun around, jumping off the countertop, trying to hide the pan behind his back. 

 

He remained silent.

 

"You know you're not allowed in the kitchen." 

 

Sanji stared blankly at him, translating in his head. He recognized a few of the words Zeff had said to him. He could work with that. 

 

"I can cook," Sanji said in English, and he held the frying pan out in front of him, doing a little flip of some imaginary stir-fry. Or something. Whatever. Zeff knew what he was saying. 

 

"There's no way I'm letting some shitty nine-year-old kid who likes to play chef use my nice and expensive pots and pans and cutlery and ingredients," Zeff growled. 

 

Sanji paused and processed the sentence with the words he knew. He actually knew most of those words when he thought about it. Zeff stood there, looming, with his arms crossed over his chest. Even when he was raging pissed, he always gave Sanji time to stop and mentally translate. 

 

He wanted to say a lot of things. He wanted to tell Zeff that he'd been cooking for years, and that he was probably better than the old shitty bastard, and that he could turn that stupid shitty restaurant into something incredible, and he would make all the chefs there look fucking stupid in comparison, just give him a goddamned  _chance_ —but he couldn't, he didn't know all the words for that, or hardly even half of them, and he grit his teeth together, incredibly frustrated. 

 

"Let me work. At the Baratie." 

 

Zeff threw his head back and laughed, and Sanji seethed. 

 

"Absolutely not." 

 

"No?" 

 

"No." 

 

_"Why!"_

 

Zeff snatched the frying pan from Sanji's grip and knocked it against his head, and the little blond clutched his skull and mumbled what could only be a string of curses in his mother tongue while he glared at his legal guardian. 

 

"Because you're an ignorant, bratty little punk with a shitty attitude, and I highly doubt you could cook anything close to being edible, much less enjoyable." 

 

“Just tonight," Sanji ground out, nearly shaking. “I’ll show you," he said, his accent so thick, stretching and softening his words too much, he knew, he wrestled with the damn vowels, they were butchered in this language, the kids at school always fucking mocked him for it, called him stupid, he spoke so  _slowly_ , and even speaking now made him so astoundingly angry. But he knew that Zeff could understand him easily at this point. "Let me cook just tonight and I’ll show you. I’m a great chef." 

 

He rarely ever spoke so many words in a single sentence. He rarely spoke at all. 

 

"Please," Sanji said, finally lifting his eyes to Zeff's. "I love to cook." 

 

Zeff regarded him for a moment, and Sanji held his breath. And after an eternity, Zeff held the frying pan out to him. "Just tonight."

 

Sanji grinned at Zeff, and he thanked him in French, because he forgot to switch over, and Zeff smiled and said, "You're welcome," once Sanji's back was turned. 

 

The actual presentation wasn't as warm and fuzzy. Zeff had hated the soup, hated all of it, told him it was all terrible, awful, and Sanji had been ready to launch himself at the old man and kick him into a coma when Zeff had offered to let him start washing dishes at the Baratie. 

 

"Dishes?" 

 

Zeff nodded at the empty plates and bowls between them. "You can't work in the restaurant as a chef until you can keep up. You took forever to make the soup you made tonight. You start with dishes, learn the pace, and then we'll see." 

 

Sanji had lit up. "We'll see? Maybe?" 

 

Zeff nodded again. "Dishes and maybe, we'll see." 

 

Sanji was smiling madly as he collected the plates and bowls from dinner and immediately set to washing everything and tidying up and displaying his aptitude for doing the dishes. He'd show that old man. 

 

He had not been prepared for the popularity of Zeff's shitty restaurant. He had not been able to keep pace at first. He'd been buried in mountains of dishes, all disgusting, and he was barely tall enough to reach into the sink—he had to stand on a milk carton—and it was torture. 

 

Two months later, he was the fastest dishwasher in the kitchen and there was no need to keep paying anyone else to do it. Which had led Sanji to a revelation. 

 

"Zeff, will you pay me for the dishes?" Sanji had asked him one day as he rubbed his hands dry with a towel. The old man had laughed at him. 

 

"I'll give you a dollar for every hundred dishes you wash." 

 

Sanji had nodded. He had very little concept of money. It sounded fair. 

 

It took longer than anticipated to amass ten dollars, but he'd done it, and he had traded it in at the cashier for a ten dollar bill, smiling to himself. It wasn't that he wasn't a good enough chef—that definitely wasn't it. He knew he was a great cook. Zeff was full of shit, he was certain of that. So it had to be something else—there must've been another reason why the old man wouldn't let him be a chef already. He'd proven he could keep up, he could speak enough English to get by when necessary—definitely enough to get by in the kitchen. 

 

It must be because he was still a kid. So Sanji would show Zeff that even though he was young, he was an adult. Or, he might as well have been. He took care of himself, and now he worked for his own money and could spend it on what he pleased. 

 

So he decided he'd buy cigarettes. That's what adults did. Children didn't smoke cigarettes. In France, everyone he knew smoked. It made sense to him that this was the natural way to go about things. 

 

And that was how he wound up in the seedier part of town, a ten dollar bill in his pocket, searching the streets. It wasn't long before he located his target. 

 

He jogged across the street and approached the older homeless man he'd seen around there before. 

 

"Excuse me," he said to him, and the dirty old man looked up at him. 

 

Sanji forced a smile. He'd practiced this part by himself. He held out his ten dollar bill to the bum and recited the phrase he'd memorized and enunciated clearly and nearly flawlessly. 

 

"If you buy me a pack of cigarettes with this, you can keep the change." 

 

The homeless man smiled. "What kind'ya want?" 

 

Sanji faltered. "What kind?" he repeated. Kind? What nice? No. Wait. Type. Kind was also type. Type was also with a computer. Fucking English. "Which one?" 

 

"Uh, yeah?" the bum paused, giving Sanji a look as the kid defaulted back to his thick accent.

 

“Uh... Marlboro? Camel? I don't know, ah... You choose. Okay? And you can keep the change?" 

 

The bum snorted. "Sure." 

 

Sanji watched him closely, ducked behind the hood of a car across the street, as the bum went into the liquor store and picked up a small bottle of clear alcohol for himself and, yes, a pack of cigarettes for Sanji. The blond grinned as the homeless man approached him and tossed him the pack. 

 

"Thank you!" Sanji said, and the man shrugged, and Sanji took the back alleys home, and he lit his first cigarette with a lighter that he stole from Zeff that the old man used to light cigars, and he choked and hacked and coughed and loved it.

 

It'd taken Zeff a while to notice. 

 

"Have you been smoking goddamn cigarettes?" he'd asked when they were sitting at the table for dinner, leaning over to smell Sanji.  

 

"So what?" he'd responded, jerking away and looking over at him, and Zeff glared back. "I'm an adult now, right?" he'd grinned. 

 

"You're an idiot, is what you are. You're going to be an even worse chef, you won't be able to smell anything.” 

 

Sanji shrugged. "You don't let me cook anyway." 

 

They hadn't spoken much after that. 

 

He'd imagined school would get better after he could speak more of the language. He was wrong. The more he tried to communicate, the more he regretted it. He didn't know why he opened his mouth. Zeff was fine to talk to, even if he was a shitty old man. The kids at his school were assholes. 

 

Things went from bad to worse. It was frustrating enough to not be able to communicate. It was utterly enraging to be made fun of for attempting it. 

 

It was nearing the end of the school year when he finally lost his shit.

 

"Does everyone wear their hair like that in France?”

 

“Does everyone in France look retarded?”

 

“Is that what fashion is like in  _Frahnce?_ " 

 

He was walking home from school. It was warm out. He was focusing on the weather. And he was also being followed. 

 

"Excuseh me, can yoo tehl me whear isseh twalet?" 

 

"I 'ave to takah fat sheet, I ate zoooo mooch French food for le breakfast!" 

 

He was ignoring them, he was completely unaware of the group of six boys tailing just behind him. 

 

"Oh, I'ma zo sooree, I cannotta help beeing a, ah, smelly Frenchman-"

 

Sanji was still walking. Staring straight ahead. Clenching his jaw so fucking hard and his hands were shaking. 

 

"What iz diis dayorant you speak of?" 

 

"In France, wee oh-nly eat—"

 

Sanji turned on his heel, dropped his backpack onto the sidewalk, and hurled himself at the boy in the middle of the group. 

 

"You'll eat my fucking fist!" Sanji shouted at him, grabbing him by the front of his shirt and slamming his fist into his face, over and over as hard as he could, and several other boys were yanking him away, twisting him around, and Sanji felt a white hot burning pain explode across his nose and his mouth. 

 

He tasted blood and he struck out at them and thrashed and yelled until he was on the ground, held down by the group, being kicked in the ribs and the stomach and he felt like he was going to fucking vomit. 

 

"You can't beat all of us, are you fucking retarded!" one shouted, leaning over him. 

 

Sanji bucked from under their grip, his chin dripping blood, and he freed his leg and kicked the kid straight in the face, and his opponent stumbled backwards, clutching his mouth, and Sanji was reduced to a punching bag. 

 

“Tu sais combien de temps ta mere met pour chier?” Sanji said when he was finally granted a momentary reprieve. He sucked a long, wet breath into his lungs, and his whole body hurt so bad in so many places that his mind was screaming at him, panicking, alarms were going off in his head, but he was almost numb to it all, almost, past the point of logical response, and his voice was steady as he swallowed and said, “Neuf mois.” 

 

His eyes were closed and his mouth was warm and maybe he was missing a tooth. Yeah. He was. He tongued the new hole in his bottom row of teeth at the back of his mouth. 

 

The six boys stood around him. “We can’t understand what you’re saying, and you sound fucking stupid. Do you want us to beat your ass some more? If you got something to say, say it in English.” 

 

Sanji was flat on his back on the sidewalk, and he opened his eyes, looking past them, up at the blue sky above him. “Fuck you. Fuck you and your lives. Eat shit. All of you." 

 

Swearing in English wasn't as fun as swearing in French, but he felt his point had been well received as he was awarded another kick to his ribs, and he curled in on his side, coughing hard, and they left him there.

 

Once they were far, far away from him, and he'd found his breath again, and his entire body was on fire, like a white-hot all-over burning sort of fire, and aching and bloody, and he was actually visibly shaking, almost unable to see straight, he sat up and crawled on his hands and knees over to his backpack, and he dug through it and found his pack of cigarettes with the lighter shoved in the cellophane, and he lit one and sat there in the grass next to the sidewalk and smoked the entire thing before dragging himself to his feet.

 

Zeff raised his eyebrows at him once he arrived home. 

 

"Damn, brat, you got your ass kicked." 

 

Sanji nodded and dropped his bag on the floor next to the door. "Assholes." 

 

"You okay?" 

 

"I'm okay." 

 

“You should try making some friends sometime. That might work out better." 

 

Sanji scrunched his nose at the idea, which he immediately regretted because it hurt like all hell.

 

"Shut up. I don't want to be friends. I hate all of them. Fuck them all." Sanji walked over to the mirror that hung in the hallway and got a look at himself and grimaced. He gingerly touched his cheekbone, which was bright red and still bleeding a little from when his face had been shoved against the concrete sidewalk. 

 

Zeff watched him from the couch. "You shouldn't get into fights. You could mess up your hands, and then you'll never be a chef." 

 

Sanji whipped around and shouted at him, "So what, if you never let me cook! Who cares! You—you’re just as, as shitty as the rest of them! You think I'm a kid! Just like them! You’ll  _never_  let me cook! I’ll wash dishes my entire life with you, shitty old man." 

 

"You  _are_  just a kid! You're barely ten years old! You should be outside with other people your age, not spending all your time being pissed off and working in the restaurant! Enjoy your youth, brat!"

 

Instead of saying anything, Sanji turned and walked down the hallway, going to the bathroom and slamming and locking the door behind him, and he cranked on the shower and tried to forget the entire day.

 

When he finally emerged over half an hour later, the apartment was empty and Sanji was glad for it. He went to his bedroom and pulled on an old t-shirt and pants and laid on his bed, glaring at the ceiling, and he felt like he got hit by a truck. 

 

Twenty minutes later, Zeff kicked open his door, and he sat up too quickly and held his pounding head. The old man walked over and dropped an old notebook on the bed next to him. Sanji looked down at it and then up at Zeff again. 

 

"Those are the recipes for the main dishes at the Baratie. Start memorizing them." 

 

For the first time in a very long time, Sanji grinned. He smiled so hard that it hurt his face. He hardly felt it. He picked up the old yellow notebook and flipped through it. He didn't see Zeff's face, quiet and happy as he watched the blond boy pour over his recipes. Sanji's eyes didn't—couldn't—leave the pages in his lap. 

 

"Thanks, old man. Thank you so much." 

 

* * *

 

 

The kitchen echoed with shouts, the clinks and clangs of pots and cutlery, the sizzle and hiss of cooking food, and the steady roar of all of the devices to bake, broil and sear.  It was hot and chaotic, and even though Sanji barked out sharp orders at his co-workers every few moments, when it was just him and the ingredients, the corners of his lips always climbed upward.  

 

Sanji could hear his shift manager hollering about something from just outside of the kitchen.  But then, that was no surprise—that prick Fullbody was always angry about something.  Usually something ridiculous, or, even more likely, something that was actually the shift manager's own fault.  From the decibel of his shouts, Sanji felt deeply confident in his assessment that it was, in fact, the latter.  His boss was a fucking idiot.

 

Gritting his teeth, Sanji refocused back on the twenty-some odd tasks he was currently performing.  It was, presumably, the tail-end of the dinner rush, and he was working on the last dozen or so orders in his queue.  

 

It hadn't been a particularly busy night, but even slower nights were always fairly fast-paced at Mariejois.  It was the only highly acclaimed restaurant within at least a ten or fifteen mile radius, so they never had a lack of demand.

 

Since he had spent over half his life in a kitchen, some of the tasks that took the older chefs awhile to get the hang of were just second nature to him.  Sanji didn't need to think and plan and contemplate—when it came to cooking, his body reacted with precision.  The other cooks were by no means inexperienced—it was just that Sanji could probably cook circles around every last one of them.  And usually did.

 

Just as he finished and plated the last of the dishes he'd been working on, the double-doors to the kitchen burst open, and his eyes snapped upwards.  One of the waitresses—a pretty young woman with twin ponytails that fell loosely along the back of her shoulders—stormed in, her cheeks ruddy and her eyes puffy. 

 

She lowered her head and walked towards the back, away from everyone else. 

 

Sanji threw down the rag he'd been using to wipe down his section and followed her. 

 

"What happened?" 

 

She wouldn't look at him, not directly, and it was obvious, the way she was gritting her teeth, her hands still clenched in fists, that she was trying extremely hard to contain herself, her eyes red and watering.

 

“Rika, what happened?”

 

Her lips slightly parted, she continued avoiding his eyes.  “It's stupid, it doesn't matter.”

 

“It obviously matters.”  Sanji bent over at his hip, lowering his head until he was eye level with her.  

 

“It's nothing, it's just... God, that jerk Fullbody,” she barely managed to choke out, tears flooding her eyes.

 

Feeling eyes on him, Sanji turned around and realized half of the kitchen was staring at them.  He turned his attention to Rika again, reaching behind her and placing his fingers on the small of her back, gently pushing her toward the rear door leading out of he kitchen.  “Come on, let's go out back for a few minutes.”

 

“Didn't you already have your break—“

 

“Who cares, let's go.”  He turned around for a moment, spotting a tall busboy who was depositing a tray full of dirty dishes into the sink. “Hey, you,” Sanji called out brusquely, jutting an index finger in his direction.  When he had his attention, the pointing finger shifted to the line of plates he'd just placed underneath the heating lights.  “All those orders need to go to table 26.”

 

The busboy's eyes briefly flitted to Rika's flushed face. “Uh, no problem, I got it,” he said, quickly grabbing the plates and hurrying away.

 

Sanji and Rika slipped out the back door, walking around the dumpsters until they found an open stretch of wall.  Sanji leaned against the brick, fishing in his pocket.  “So, what'd that asshole do this time?” he asked, as he jammed a cigarette between his lips, cupping his hand around the end of it as he flicked on the lighter.

 

“You probably heard him screaming his head off,” Rika said, her voice considerably calmer now.  “I was waiting on this guy who ordered a bunch of stuff, and when I brought him his check, he couldn't pay for it. I didn't know what else to do so I got Fullbody, and, I don't know, he totally flipped.  Started screaming at me and stuff.”

 

“At you?  That's not your fault, though,” Sanji said sharply, a swell of rage flooding through him.

 

“I know!” she practically shouted, her face flushing again. 

 

“What the hell does he think you're gonna do, ask people if they have money up front?  We're not a fucking McDonald's.”

 

“He said I should've known better, letting 'someone like that' just order whatever they wanted.”

 

“'Someone like that?' Did he actually say that?”  While Sanji wasn't quite sure what his dumbshit of a boss might have meant by that, the rage bubbling within him was quickly rising to a boil.  He took a deep drag from his cigarette, rapidly burning through the tobacco rod.

 

“Yeah, his exact words,” she said, wiping away what might have been a tear with the back of her hand.

 

“What the hell is wrong with him? It’s that fucking cocksucker’s job to handle these situations, not yours,” Sanji said, pausing briefly and glancing up at her again to add in a quick, “Sorry.” Rika actually rolled her eyes at him—fair enough, they’d worked together for over a year and she was certainly familiar with his vernacular, but, still.

 

He took a final long drag on his cigarette before dropping it on the ground, stomping down on it with finality. “I’m not gonna let this shit slide.”

 

Sanji brushed past her, making long, agitated strides toward the back door.

 

“What are you doing?” Rika called after him,  almost running to keep up with his pace.  

 

“I'm going to give Fullbody a piece of my mind.”

 

"What are you talking about? He's with that customer right now! Don't go out there, oh my god, he's going to get so freaking mad.”

 

“Like I give a shit!” Sanji called back at her, striding through the kitchen with purpose, bursting through the double doors into the lobby of the restaurant.  

 

He was seeing red, barely paying any attention to the throngs of customers, most of whom seemed like they were getting ready to leave.  Several tables of customers were beginning to rise from their seats, sliding back heavy, upholstered chairs, as they pulled themselves away from thick white tablecloths.  

 

But Sanji was fuming, and could barely look twice at any of them.  That asshole, there was no reason to yell at the employees like that, especially a sweet young woman like Rika.  Just because that stupid bastard barely knew how to do his job didn't mean he should make others feel bad for it.

 

The lights were low, most of the lit candles on the table tops brighter than the warm glow of the ornate light fixtures adorning the ceilings.  But even in the low lights, Sanji was easily able to make out that miserable prick, that make-shift boss who got to pretend he was in charge a couple of nights a week when the regular manager wasn't around.He quickly spotted the stupid mop of disgusting pink-hued hair, standing arms-crossed in front of a table in the corner of the restaurant.  He was puffing out his chest in self-importance as he glared down at the scrappy young man sitting in the booth.

 

As he approached Fullbody, Sanji only gave the customer a quick glance.  He was mildly surprising; he was much younger than the usual Mariejois patrons, who were middle-aged-to-elderly, and he was a little.... bedraggled, maybe?  His shaggy, dark hair was slightly in need of a combing, and his clothes were very casual and rumpled.  Even as he was likely going through a very difficult conversation, he worn an airy, careless smile.

 

But then his attention was turned back to Fullbody, his face contorting into a scowl.  Sanji approached the table, stepping right up next to him.

 

“I need to talk to you,” Sanji said lowly, interrupting Fullbody mid-sentence.

 

He turned toward Sanji, his eyes wide, lips curled back as he clenched his teeth in anger.  “I'm with a customer, what are you doing out here?” he asked in an angry whisper.

 

“I said, I need to talk to you,” he repeated, keeping his voice hushed but not quite whispering.  “Right now.”

 

“I am dealing with something right now, get back in the kitchen where you belong and do your goddamn job,” Fullbody practically hissed, his eyes bugging in rage.  

 

“I can get into it right here, if you'd prefer.”

 

Fullbody turned back toward the customer, still gritting his teeth as he forced his face to return to a slightly more natural expression.  “If you could excuse me for just a moment.”

 

“Sure,” the customer said, smiling widely.

 

Fullbody grabbed Sanji by the forearm, yanking him away from the table toward the hallway leading to the restrooms.  When they were out of earshot of any customers, Fullbody grabbed Sanji by the shoulders, his face contorting in fury. “What the  _hell_ is wrong with you?”

 

“You're what's wrong with me.  You can't treat your employees like they're fucking dirt,” Sanji replied sharply, ripping Fullbody's hands off of him.  “And don't you ever fucking lay your hands on me again.”

 

“I don't know what you're talking about, but you can't talk to me like that,” Fullbody declared with a swell of importance.

 

“I'm talking about Rika.”

 

“About Rika?” Fullbody sneered at the mention of her name.  “I'm not even done dealing with that stupid bitch for the mess she's gotten the restaurant into right now.”

 

Sanji's hand clenched into a fist, his eyebrow twitching.  “How fucking dramatic are you... how is one customer not paying a 'mess' for the restaurant?  You're just a lazy bastard who doesn't want to deal with anything that takes you away from slacking off in the back office.”

 

“All you do is throw chunks of meat into a pan, you don't know shit about what I go through each and every day to make sure you keep getting a paycheck.”

 

Sanji closed his eyes for a minute, forcing himself to steady his breathing, shoving his hands inside of his pockets.  If he didn't, he just might punch him.  It could happen.  It was going to happen if he thought about it too hard.  He swallowed, hard, trying to move past the words he wanted to say—because there was a more important thing he needed to convey to this dumbshit right now.

 

“What you did to Rika—that's no way to treat anyone at all, and certainly not that extremely nice girl who is  _infinitely_  better at her job than you'll ever be at yours,” Sanji finally said.

 

“I can treat her however I like, I hired her.”

 

“You didn't hire anybody here and you don't even have the authority to fire her if you wanted,  _shift_ manager.”

 

“You better watch how you're talking to me, you piece of shit, because after the owner finds out how you lipped off to me tonight, you're going to—“

 

“Listen, Fullbody, you're a little new here, so you have some shit to figure out still,” Sanji interrupted, his voice trilling with anger.  “For one, the owner cares a lot more about their shift manager making a huge fucking scene by yelling at some punk kid who can't pay his bill, and having all these rich fucks seeing and talking about it and making complaints and never coming back because we look unprofessional as hell, than losing out on a single fucking dinner check. There's protocol for situations like this, so learn it, maybe.  Shouldn't you know that, with your  _authority_ and all?”  His words dripped with condescension.  

 

Fullbody's lip quivered in rage, his face flushed.  But it seemed he had run out of things to say.  He walked past Sanji, letting his shoulder ram into Sanji's as he brushed past him, heading back to the table where the customer was presumably still waiting.

 

Sanji hovered near the entrance of the hallway, trying to make out some of the conversation.   He heard the customer make a few surprisingly relaxed comments, and Fullbody was saying “You're not really leaving me a whole lot of options here,” and “I'm going to have to make a call.”  

 

As Sanji watched Fullbody walk away from the table and head toward the double-doors to the kitchen—presumably toward the back office, to make a call to the owner—a ridiculous idea came to Sanji.

 

He approached the table, getting a better look at the customer.

 

He was young—probably right around Sanji's age—and for some reason, even though he was in big trouble, he wore an aloof smile on his face.

 

“Oh, hey, you're that guy,” the customer said.  “Looks like whatever you said to that manager guy got him pretty mad.  I thought the vein in his head was gonna pop right open when he came back over here.”

 

“Yeah, I might've gotten him a little rattled,” Sanji smiled faintly.  Glancing behind him, confirming Fullbody was nowhere in sight, he slid into the other side of the booth, leaning forward.  “So, listen... Do you really not have  _any_  money? Or credit cards or anything?”

 

“I've got about forty bucks on me, but that's it.  Man, the bill was way more than I thought it'd be,” the customer replied, seemingly unfazed that Sanji had sat down with him.

 

“Forty dollars, huh... Yeah, that may not quite cover it,” Sanji thought.  If he'd just gotten an entree, it could have been close enough for Fullbody to agree to let it slide and just avoid the hassle.  But Sanji remembered Rika's comment, about how he had ordered a lot of food.  That probably meant he got actual courses.  Appetizer and dessert, at least.  Sanji reached forward and grabbed the check.  His eyes widened as he read the total.  “Two hundred and eighty-seven dollars?! Were you here with other people?”

 

“Nah, it's just me.”

 

Sanji scanned the items on the receipt.  “You ordered four entrees and an appetizer, just for yourself?” His eyes searched the table a moment, but he didn't see any to-go containers.  “Wait, did you actually finish it?”

 

“Yeah, of course, it was really good,” he said, tilting his head to the side slightly.  “But you know, I had no idea the food was going to be so expensive here.  Your menu's really confusing, with all those numbers, like, um... 32.5 and 17.  I figured they were maybe sizes or something?”  He scratched his head.  “But that guy with the pink hair told me they were the prices.  Even though they didn't have that S thing with the lines or anything?”

 

S thing with the lines?  What the... Did he mean a dollar sign? 

 

Was this guy for real?

 

“You thought they were... sizes.”

 

“Everything was pretty small here, too,” the dark-haired man went on.  “I don't really get why everything's so much...  I mean, I'm pretty sure I could've gotten like fifteen or twenty cheeseburgers with forty bucks, but I didn't have nearly that much food here.”

 

Was this guy... for real?

 

"I was going to order more."

 

Holy. Shit.

 

"Fullbody might really call the cops over this,” Sanji muttered under his breath.

 

The customer's smile faded as he regarded Sanji with confusion.  “What?  Why?  Can't I just come back with the money?"

 

"Are you going to have it any time soon?"

 

"Yeah.  Wait.  Hold on," he said, frowning deeply as he stared down at the tabletop.  "How much is three hundred dollars... that's about... Okay, yeah, I'll have it on Thursday."

 

"They'd normally let you pay it back in a couple days, as long as they had a copy of your license, but—” 

 

"Oh, I've actually got that!" he exclaimed, pulling a plastic card out of his wallet and slamming it down on the table before Sanji could finish.  "So I can come back in a couple days, right?"

 

“...I was going to say, but, I don't think that guy's going to let you get off with just that now.”  After all, Fullbody was the type who liked to show off any pathetic little shred of authority he could.  It wasn't much, but if he could get this guy arrested, he probably would.

 

Besides, this wasn't a rich old man who accidentally forgot his wallet—this was a messy young kid who stuck out like a sore thumb inside of this kind of establishment.  He was wearing a disheveled t-shirt and shorts, old leather sandals, and he looked like he had been kind of roughed up.  Sanji's gaze drifted to his knuckles.  Were those scrapes?

 

But he didn't seem like a bad guy.  Just incredibly dumb.  Astoundingly, even.

 

"You're really going to have the money on Thursday?" Sanji asked, leaning back as he stared at him, pressing his hand to his mouth as he sized him up.  

 

"Yeah, definitely," he assured, with a surprisingly genuine grin.  

 

“Alright, so if I—okay, say I cover for you tonight.  You'd really be able to pay me back on Thursday, right?”  He paused to pinch the bridge of his nose.  Shit, he knew this was an awful idea—but when he thought about the look on Fullbody's face when he found out he wasn't going to get to slam down on anybody, it sort of made it feel worth it.

 

“Yeah, for sure!” the customer exclaimed, his face brightening.  “You're really gonna do that for me?”

 

Sanji nodded uneasily.

 

“Wow, thanks, man.  Hey, what's your name?"  

 

"Sanji."

 

"Thanks, Sanji!" he smiled with relief, his jubilance rivaling a kid on Christmas.  “I'm Luffy, by the way.”

 

"Luffy, huh...  Well, I'm going to come to you on Thursday, then.  Is this your address?"  He asked, jamming a thumb on the driver's license still laying on the table.  

 

"Nah, I don't live there anymore.  It's uh... Hold on," he said, pulling out his wallet again.  He produced a crumpled piece of paper with dozens of scribbled notes, written in every direction, in what looked like a grade-schooler's penmanship.

 

"The hell is that?" Sanji asked, frowning at the paper.

 

"Hold on, I've got my address on here.  Umm...  It's... Oh, here it is.  20 Thriller Bark Lane."

 

Thriller Bank Lane... The street name was familiar.  "That by the campus?" he asked, squinting.

 

"By Sabaody?  Yeah, it's right next to it.  It's a big, cool house."

 

"Okay.  I'm going to be there Thursday afternoon, then.”  Sanji reached into his back pocket, pulling out his wallet.  He'd just cashed a paycheck, so he had plenty of money in there.  Counting out fifteen twenty dollar bills, he tossed them on top of the bill.  “Now you better cut out of here before my boss gets back.”  

 

"Awesome.  I owe you one, Sanji!"

 

"Damn right you do," Sanji muttered. 

 

“See you Thursday!” Luffy called back after him as he made a bee line for the entrance.

 

Sanji pulled himself to his feet and nonchalantly strolled back toward the kitchen.  Just before he reached the double doors, Fullbody sauntered out, wearing a triumphant grin.  At first, he ignored Sanji,  searching for the customer in the corner booth.  When he saw he was gone, his face fell.

 

“You!” Fullbody shouted at Sanji, spinning around and pointing at him.  “Where'd he go?”

 

“Hmm, where'd who go?” 

 

He scowled.  “Who else.  That kid in the booth.”

 

“Oh, that guy?” Sanji glanced over his shoulder, shrugging nonchalantly.  “I don't know, I think he just paid his bill and left.”

 

“What?! But how—but the police are on their way,” he choked, losing his composure for a moment, as he practically ran to the now-empty table, snatching up the wad of twenty dollar bills.

 

With a smirk, Sanji disappeared back into the kitchen.  Rika was standing near the doorway, looking up at him apprehensively.

 

“Don't worry,” Sanji smiled reassuringly, giving her a thumbs up.  “We got it squared away.”

 

Later that evening, Fullbody screamed at Sanji for a full ten minutes in the back.  But as pissed as he was, Sanji was confident that his job was safe; after all, he was one of the best damn cooks they'd ever had.  

 

Besides, Fullbody could really only get mad at his insubordination.  As much as Fullbody wanted to blame him for making him look like such a goddamn fool, as he explained to the police that the customer who had refused to pay somehow miraculously came up with three hundred dollars in cash, he had absolutely no way of proving Sanji had anything to do with it.  After all, why would a part time cook and college student throw around that kind of money for a stranger?

 

Thursday rolled around quickly, and Sanji went to collect his money.

 

If the house at the end of Thriller Bark Lane had been any less decrepit, Sanji may have been a little worried that he had been given a fake address.  

 

It almost reminded him of a haunted house.  Almost.  Most of the houses on the road were new but small; he was pretty sure  _starter_ was the word for it.  Not many people would want to live right next to a college campus when they were well into their careers and families and rest of their damn lives, so it seemed like a logical decision on the part of whoever had the houses built to begin with.

 

So there they were, rows of neat, uniform houses on either side of the street... And then, a short stretch of nothing but overgrown brambles and trees, until he reached these two fucking anomalies at the dead-end of the road.  

 

One of the houses was a fairly reasonable size—not much larger than the starter homes, although clearly many decades older.  Instead of being against the road or lined up with a driveway, it kind of looked like the house had been just dropped haphazardly in the middle of an empty lot, the builder not really caring that the front door didn't align with the road in any particular way.  It looked like there was a winding driveway that wrapped around to the side of it, leading to garages that looked like they were built after-the-fact and obviously were not part of the original house.  Sanji was pretty sure he could hear the sound of someone playing a piano as he walked by it.

 

But that house wasn't the address that Luffy had given him.  Rather, his destination was the absurdly large home at the end of the street that sat there like a shitty mantlepiece.  The yard was surprisingly large—for houses in the area, anyway.  Most houses were lucky to have a space large enough to hold a small family barbecue without being too overcrowded.  But this house had an ample front yard, and it looked like there was undeveloped land behind it.  Weird.

 

"You better really live here, bastard," Sanji muttered under his breath as he walked up to the house.  He paused for a moment, taking the last few drags on his cigarette before he stomped out the butt of it under his oxfords.   

 

The house was in even worse condition than he first imagined.  Climbing the steps up the porch, he heard the groans and creaks of ancient wood shifting under his feet.  He hoped he wasn't going to fall through the fucking floor.

 

He knocked on the front door, normally at first.  After a minute or two of silence from inside of the house, he rapped at the weather-worn wood with a bit more demand, peeling paint flaking off beneath his knuckles.  Scowling, he brushed off his hands, glaring at the oversized door.

 

He waited, and no one came.

 

"Well, fuck."

 

Apparently the bastard really wasn't there.  What a fucking waste of time.

 

Although the house was close to the college and his work, he hadn't needed to be at either today, and the shitty apartment he was renting half a room from was over thirty minutes away by bus.

 

Jamming another cigarette in between his teeth, he contemplated how long he should hang out on the rickety porch.  Never mind the time it took for the bus ride, he really need that money.  Badly, actually.  Three hundred dollars was a lot—it wasn't like he ever had much to spare.

 

With a sigh, he leaned against the side of the house, forgetting its condition.  Then he remembered the flaking paint and, cursing again, angrily tried to brush it off of his shirt and dockers.

 

Suddenly, the door creaked open behind him.  Whirling around, Sanji saw a mop of messy, dark hair.  Luffy looked up at him, bleary-eyed and yawning.

 

"Oh hey, restaurant guy," he said, languidly throwing the door open.

 

"Uh, hey," Sanji said, suddenly at a loss for words.  He kind of looked like hell.  His lip was a little swollen and... Was that blood on his shirt?

 

Also, was that a hoodie with cut-off sleeves?

 

"That's right, I owe you.  It was... Uh... How much,” Luffy started digging through his pockets, producing a stack of crumpled twenty dollar bills.  He handed Sanji the fistful of bills with a grin.  “That's enough, right?" 

 

Dumbfounded, Sanji took the money from him, smoothing out the bills and placing them in a neat stack.  After counting, he wordlessly handed back eight of the twenty dollar bills, keeping back the three hundred dollars he was due. 

 

What the hell was wrong with this guy?  Sanji could have pocketed all of that, and he would've never known. 

 

"Well, thanks," he said, taking a quick drag from his cigarette.  "So, uh, I guess that's it.”

 

"Hey, you wanna come in, I've got meat."

 

"What?"

 

"Yeah, come on, my friend brought some meat over.  You know how to cook it, right?  I'll let you have as much as you want, if you do."

 

Sanji's gaze swept inside of the house.  It was huge and dark and looked pretty empty.  He could make out the counter to what looked like a fairly expansive kitchen from the doorway.  After hesitating for a moment, he shrugged, muttering, “Sure, why the hell not.”  He paused to put out his cigarette before he stepped inside, leaving the butt resting on the porch next to the door.  He'd take care of it when he left.  If he remembered.

 

He didn't really understand why he was going—but his instinct wasn't telling him there was anything onerous waiting for him inside.  Even if the house sort of looked like the set for a B-horror movie. If anything, Luffy's aura was pretty relaxed—and maybe tinged with a hint of excitement, which Sanji presumed was over getting someone to cook for him.

 

The house was just as huge inside as it looked on the outside.  The condition of the place didn't seem much different, either.  

 

The wooden floors were old and scuffed, in desperate need of a polishing. Refinishing.  Whatever made them look like they weren't old, rotting planks.

 

The walls had  _wallpaper_ , of all things.  It reminded him of a restored old mansion he had seen as part of a tour for school when he was younger—all the fixtures and the decorations were made to mimic how the place looked in the early 19-whatevers.  Except this place wasn't restored, and the mauve-and-white patterned paper was entirely peeled off in some places, revealing the dingy drywall underneath.

 

That, and the place was pretty sparsely furnished... for the size of it, anyway.  Most noticeably, there were two ancient couches and a loveseat near the entrance, in a large area that was clearly functioning as the living room.  None of it matched.  Just like the wood of the coffee table in between the couches wasn't the same color as the wood of the large, clunky dining table.  And the bar stools near the edge of the kitchen counter were metal—not a damn thing matched.

 

It was so quiet inside.

 

"So, uh... Is there anyone else here?"

 

For a split second—so quickly, Sanji thought he may have imagined it—Luffy's face fell.  But the leisurely expression returned in an instant, and he shook his head from side to side.  "Nah, I'm the only one who lives here right now.  But hey, are you looking for a place? You can move in!"

 

Sanji shifted uneasily on his feet, not sure how to respond to the off-putting question—there was no way he was serious, after all.

 

"Kitchen, right?" Sanji asked, nodding toward the countertops, and the large archway to the right that served as the kitchen entrance.  He was pleasantly surprised by how expansive it was, actually.  

 

"Huh, all this stuff is actually newer, isn't it," he murmured, mostly to himself.  Not new—but new enough to actually have some appliances made from the last half-century.

 

"Sure, I guess.  Open the fridge!"

 

"Yeah, okay," Sanji replied, swinging open the creaky door and squatting down in front of it.

 

There was meat, all right—and not a lot else.  Pork chops, flank steaks, spareribs.  He could tell just by looking at it that it had probably been in his fridge for a couple of days.  "Uh, this stuff needs to get cooked," Sanji told him, narrowing his eyes as he looked at the condition of the meat.  Good cuts—but they wouldn't be good for long.

 

"Yeah, that's the point," Luffy replied with a laugh, leaning over the top of the door, looking down at Sanji.  "You'll make it, won't you?"

 

"You want me to make all of this?" he asked incredulously.

 

"Yep.  You can, right?"

 

“I can but..." he trailed off.  Well, it's not like he had anything better to do, anyway.  And he was pretty sure it would go bad otherwise—he really hated seeing food go to waste.

 

"Fine, but we're going to need to clean up in here a little first," Sanji replied with a sigh, glancing over at the dirty countertop and sink full of dishes.  

 

Luffy hummed excitedly as Sanji put him to work, first wiping down the surfaces and then drying dishes while he washed them. 

 

"Uh, how have you been cooking the meat, anyway?" Sanji asked, noticing there were no pots or pans dirty. 

 

"I microwaved it." 

 

"What."  Sanji nearly dropped the dish he was holding.  He desperately wished there was some way he could have misheard that, but it was pretty quiet other than the sound of running water.  And Luffy's voice was, well, loud.

 

"Usually I don't cook it, but there was so much, I thought I'd try.  So I put it in a bowl in the microwave for awhile."

 

"Yeah, don't... don't ever do that," Sanji grimaced, finishing the last plate and handing it to Luffy.  "You have pans though, right?"

 

"Probably," he said cheerfully, setting down the plate that he sort of forgot to completely dry as he started pulling open cupboards and drawers.

 

Everything was in disarray.  Sanji's hand twitched—it was so disorganized, even though there was so much space to do a great set up.  He was already imagining where he would be keeping things, if it were his kitchen.  Not to mention, it seemed like there were a few high quality pieces of cookware shoved in among the bric a brac.

 

Sanji started opening cupboards as well.  Noticing something he could use, he pulled a heavy stainless steel pan out of a cabinet beneath one of the counters.  Multiple empty plastic containers, sporting colorful branding logos like Cool Whip and Country Crock, exploded outward in the process, spilling onto the floor, along with various other items including a cookie sheet, a couple of spatulas and miscellaneous measuring cups.  

 

"Is this all your stuff?"

 

"Nah, it was just in the house," he replied, bending over to haphazardly shove the plastic containers and cups back in the cupboard.  "So, are you gonna cook all of it?"

 

"Yeah, I guess," Sanji sighed.  He didn't have much reason not to.

 

"Really?" Luffy asked, his grin the widest Sanji had seen yet—and it was damn infectious, too.  In spite of himself, he found himself smiling back a little.

 

"Yeah, it's going to go bad soon.  If you have spices, I can probably do something good to it, too."

 

"Sure," Luffy said, pulling open two long drawers.  They were filled to the brim with single-serving containers—ketchup, mayonnaise, soy sauce, jelly, hot sauce, and god-only-knows what else—and packets of salt and pepper.  Grinning, Luffy grabbed several of the paper packets and tossed them on the counter next to the stove. "There you go!"

 

"Uh... just salt and pepper?"

 

"Yeah.  Those are spices, right?"

 

"Yeah, I guess so," Sanji sighed.  It was okay though—he could work with minimal ingredients.  

 

Two hours later, he was back in the kitchen, packing leftover meat into the shitty recycled plastic containers that had exploded on him when he first found a pan.

 

Granted, there wasn't much of the meat left—now Sanji understood how Luffy had been able to eat so many entrees at the restaurant the other day.  Still, there were at least some leftovers for him.

 

But suddenly, packaging leftover meat seemed like the most unimportant thing in the world.  Because Luffy, who had brought up his earlier offer of letting Sanji move in, had just dropped a bombshell that made him instantly stop what he was doing as he spun around to stare at him, his mouth agape.

 

"There's no fucking way that's true."

 

"It is, though.  That's all it costs to rent a room here."

 

"Like, your  _own_  room?"

 

"...Yeah?" He scratched his head, like it was a strange question.

 

Sanji's mind reeled.  "There's no way.  I'm paying more than that to  _share_  a room with some asshole right now."

 

"Move in here, then," Luffy said, surprisingly matter-of-fact. 

 

"Yeah right, if they're that cheap, I'm sure they're reserved.  Fall semester starts next month and this is right next to the damn school.”

 

“I told you, there's no one living here.”

 

Sanji stared at Luffy, trying to assess whether or not he was messing with him.  He was a kind of goofy guy—but right now, he didn't look like he was kidding. In fact, he looked dead serious.

 

“Uh.  I'm gonna have to think about it,” he said finally.

 

“You wanna see the rooms?  You can pick out whatever one you like.”

 

A bit dumbfounded, Sanji let Luffy lead him through the house and give him an ambling tour.  Although the things Luffy pointed out didn't matter that much—like the creepy old man picture on the wall of the dining room, or the alien symbol someone had carved into the wood under one of the area rugs—Sanji was able to get a better look at things.  The first story was mostly wide open, with the kitchen, living room and dining room being one shared space.  There was a large stairwell to the left of the kitchen that led to the upper story.  And to the left of that, there was a short hallway, with three doors near the end of it.  

 

Luffy stopped at the base of the stairwell for a moment, looked at the three doors.  

 

“There's a room over there, but I don't know, it doesn't seem like it'd be  _your_ room,” Luffy mentioned, waving a hand at the direction of one of the doors before he started climbing the stairs.  Sanji wasn't exactly sure what the hell that meant, but they didn't stop to look at it, in any event.  One of the doors was open, and he could see it led to a small bathroom.  The other door, he wasn't so sure—a basement, maybe?

 

The stairwell was almost excessively wide, and the steps were covered with ancient-looking burgundy carpeting that looked like it may not have been cleaned in decades.  A little gross—but Sanji wasn't really one for walking around barefoot, anyway.

 

The bedrooms upstairs—four, in total—were in the same condition as the first floor.  They all had similar (although mismatched) furniture: a bed with some kind of end table, an old desk and chair, and some kind of dresser or bureau.  Probably typical, for rooms for rent near the college.  

 

But they were all pretty fucking big, somehow.  Way bigger than the piece-of-shit room he'd been sharing with some ill-tempered guy who got up at five in the morning every damn day, rain or shine—well, it was always shine, this time of year—to do his stupid jogging routine, banging everything around in the process, even if Sanji had just gotten home a few hours earlier.  

 

“So, since you're first, you get to pick whatever one you want.”

 

“Since I'm first?”

 

“Yeah, you know.  To rent something.”

 

“Wait, none of these are yours,” Sanji realized.  “You do live here, right?”

 

“Yeah, of course.  It's just none of these.”

 

Shrugging it off, Sanji took a long, wistful look into the bedroom they were currently standing in the doorway of.  It was near the end of the hall, right next to the bathroom, and the bed was actually a full size, instead of a twin.  There were windows on both the back and side walls—which probably meant he could get a pretty good cross breeze, even on a warm day like today.  

 

And from this location, he was pretty sure he could walk to Sabaody University in the amount of time it took him to take the bus.  Same for work.  And old or not, the kitchen was pretty impressive...

 

“Well, shit,” he muttered underneath his breath; he was dangerously close to making what might have been a rather reckless decision.  But it was getting more difficult by the minute to even think about sharing that awful room he currently lived in for even a few more days.

 

Luffy grinned knowingly.  “So you're gonna take this one, then?”

 

“Shit,” he muttered again, his gaze locked on the inside of the room.  “I think I am.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

It only took two trips for Usopp to move all his shit in. Luffy had helped him move his carpenter's chest up the creaky stairs, and it was fucking difficult only because the stupid fucking kid kept making him laugh, and that made his limbs go limp, and he was having such trouble holding up his end.  Even with all of the tools he has amassed over the past several years temporarily removed from the chest's drawers, it was still ridiculously heavy. 

 

Usopp had only met Luffy a couple days prior. He'd been up at the school, pacing the used books in the shop, grimacing at the price tags. Used, even! He'd mentally decided to try to find the books online, and yeah, he shouldn't have waited this long to do it, it was the beginning of August already, he knew that, but he had things to do. Like work in a little coffee shop at the worst hours and try to figure out what the hell he was doing otherwise. 

 

After he'd given up on required text shopping, he'd walked out to his car, moving slow in the sweltering heat, and arrived upon a tanned kid with black hair and a motor scooter in a few pieces in the parking spot next to his. Well, maybe not really a kid—he was probably about Usopp's age.  He felt younger though, somehow.

 

"Uh, do you need help?" Usopp asked, almost regretting it when the other guy's head whipped around and looked at him like he was some sort of Godsend. 

 

"Can you fix these things? I have no idea what I'm doing. I thought if I took it apart, I might understand it, but I'm starting to feel like it was a bad idea," he told him, gesturing to all the parts—the internal components of the scooter—spread out around him. 

 

"How'd you even get it apart if you don't know what you're doing?" 

 

"Well, a lot of it was screwed in, so I just... unscrewed it." 

 

"With what?" 

 

He held up a screwdriver and a set of wrenches. "I borrowed these from the engineering department." 

 

Usopp took a step towards him and looked around at the mess the other guy had made. It was too hot outside for this bullshit. He shouldn't have said anything. Damn it. 

 

"What was wrong with it in the first place?" Usopp asked, leaning against his own car. A station wagon.  Wood-paneled, with a little bit of rust around the edges. Not glorious, nowhere near new or even good condition, but it got the job done. 

 

"It dies when it idles. I got it here, but it seems kinda ... done. I was gonna call someone, but my phone died too. All my stuff died, basically. And also, I lost my phone. I mean, it's probably here at the school somewhere. Maybe. I dunno." He shrugged, not coming off as very concerned with his misplaced phone. "Anyway, can you fix this?" 

 

"Probably not. Give me that screwdriver. And stand back—just, stand far away. In fact, you know what, maybe go look for your phone. Don't touch any of this anymore. Ever again." 

 

The young man grinned and held out his screwdriver. "Thanks." 

 

"Uh-huh." Usopp took said screwdriver and grabbed the wrench set and sat down on the warm asphalt next to the scooter, which was turned on its side, and he picked up a black cylindrical piece on the ground next to him. "This is the oil filter, why would you even—"

 

"I don't know, it looked like it could be a thing!" 

 

Usopp looked over at the other man, who was peering in his car. He had a lot of his shit in there, as he was, ideally, moving. Away from the dorms. To hell with the dorms. "You're a flipping idiot." 

 

The young man laughed and it was way too hot outside for this bullshit. High tops were a bad choice. He should’ve worn sandals. And maybe shorts. Damn it.

 

It took Usopp all of twenty minutes to get the scooter back to its original state.  And in doing so, he assessed that there probably wasn't anything wrong with the motor, and the spark plugs were still all good, surprisingly, and the jets weren't clogged, and the choke was connected fine, so... 

 

He stood up and righted the scooter, flipping down the kickstand, and he opened up the seat and leaned over, peering down into it. The sun was starting to go down, and he pulled his phone from his back pocket and shined it into the seat opening. 

 

"Toss me the screwdriver," Usopp said to the other man, who had made himself at home sitting next to the tools that Usopp had left on the hood of his car. 

 

His throw was terrible, but Usopp's hand-eye coordination made up for it, and he caught the screwdriver with his left hand and stuck it into the opening under the seat and tightened a gold screw with a spring around it.

 

"You got the keys?" Usopp asked, suddenly wondering if this guy had lost those, too. 

 

He hopped off the car and searched his pockets and produced a small set of keys, his facial features lighting up. Maybe he'd had the same thought as Usopp. "I do!" 

 

"Start it up." 

 

He hopped on the scooter and did so, and the motor turned over and fired up and hummed as it sat there in neutral. He looked extremely impressed. 

 

"Your idle screw was getting loose," Usopp told him over the drone of the little engine. 

 

"What's your name?" he asked him. 

 

"Usopp." 

 

"Weird name. I'm Luffy—do you go to school here?" 

 

Usopp narrowed his eyes at Luffy's review of his name. The guy's name was  _Luffy,_  and Usopp was the weird one of the two? 

 

"Yeah," Usopp told him, walking over to his car, his hands now dirty and blackened. 

 

"What's your major?" Luffy continued, following Usopp around to the driver's side door, letting his scooter run. 

 

"Engineering—listen, do you want me to take those tools back for you? Will you actually remember?" 

 

"An engineering major, huh... so you can probably fix, like, a lot of shit." 

 

"Not really. I'm not a handyman. Scooters just aren't necessarily super complex." Usopp unlocked his car, but before he could open the door, the shorter man put a hand on the window, interrupting his process. 

 

"You looking for a place to stay?" 

 

"What makes you ask that?" Usopp shifted his weight from one leg to the other. 

 

Luffy nodded to his car—specifically, the many boxes and bags stacked in there. "It looks like you got most of your life packed into this thing. So either you live in it, or you're moving. Right? Is that not right?" 

 

"I'm looking for a place," Usopp told him. 

 

Luffy grinned. "Perfect. In exchange for fixing my scooter, you can come live at my place!" 

 

"Your place?" 

 

"Yeah, I stay in this big house, and there's only one other guy there now, but there's plenty of room and the rent is real cheap. Like stupid cheap. It's not far away. Here, you can just follow me there in your car and check it out. It's  _really awesome_." 

 

And Usopp actually  _had_  followed him, oddly enough, and he actually  _did_  check out the house, and yeah, it was a little decrepit, and it wasn't exactly pretty, but when Luffy told him how much rent was a month, he'd had a hard time coming up with a good excuse as to why he shouldn't move in, peeling wallpaper be damned. 

 

So that was that. 

 

Two trips, and he was moved in. 

 

Living with Luffy was… interesting. He’d never met someone with such extreme highs and lows. He was either full of energy, laughing loudly and almost breaking things and in and out of the house like a whirlwind, or he was dead asleep, nearly unable to be woken. 

 

He treated Usopp like they’d been friends for years. 

 

After living there for only a few days, Usopp already felt like he was at home. It was weird. And he couldn’t really explain it. It was the way he sat around that giant living room/dining room/kitchen area downstairs, sprawled over one of the couches with Luffy hanging off the big love seat, telling Usopp about all the trouble he’d gotten himself into throughout life. And Usopp laughed openly, drinking a beer and wasting away the afternoon, still a little wired from his morning shift at the coffee shop. Those kinds of moments.

 

And then, there were periods of time when Luffy wouldn’t say much at all. He became more of an observer, sitting and watching with a smile on his face. And other times, Usopp noticed he would go and be by himself, climbing through one of the upstairs bedroom windows and onto the roof, where he’d lay on his back for stretches of time, staring at the sky. Usopp had only discovered this when Luffy had scared the shit out of him by coming in through his window one evening. After that, Luffy had insisted Usopp climb up there with him and check out the view. 

 

It really was a nice view. And then again, Usopp wasn’t a fan of falling off a roof and breaking his neck, so he hadn’t stayed up there very long. 

 

His other roommate, Sanji, was another interesting character. And an amazing cook. The first night Usopp was officially moved in, Sanji had prepared a huge meal for the three of them, and it was very likely that it’d been the best food Usopp’s tongue had ever had the privilege of tasting. 

 

The blond was, for the most part, fairly nice. He had a temper, though, that’d nearly startled Usopp out of his chair one afternoon.

 

Sanji’s voice was smooth and low and controlled, and he had a casual, easy way of talking that made Usopp feel like he could relax. But the second or third day he’d been there, Sanji had caught Luffy digging around the fridge, and Usopp got a taste of the decibel level Sanji was perfectly capable of reaching. Sanji’s nature could go from easy-going to straight bellicose like he was flipping some kind of switch. Like pressing a button.  

 

“ _Hey!_  What the fuck are you doing, you little shit!” Sanji had shouted as he walked in the door, spotting Luffy across the room in the kitchen. 

 

“I’m not doing anything!” Luffy chirped, ducking away and making a break for the couch. Usopp became an unwilling buffer. 

 

“You’re in there eating all the food I bought to fucking make dinner, you shitty little thief!” Sanji yelled, stalking towards Luffy, who circled around, keeping the couch between him and the irate man. 

 

“I’m not a thief! I’m, uh, I was… borrowing it?” 

 

“That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard in my life and it doesn’t change the fact that I’m gonna kick you through the wall if I catch you again,” Sanji threatened, looking like he entirely meant every word he’d said. 

 

Usopp was frozen, the page of the book he’d been reading half-turned. Sanji’s blue eyes fell from Luffy to Usopp. 

 

“If you catch that little fuck in the fridge again, kick his ass,” Sanji commanded. 

 

“Uh, you got it.” Usopp hadn’t known what else to say. 

 

Honestly, Usopp liked Sanji a lot. Despite being a little scary, he was pretty enjoyable. Usopp didn’t even mind that he smoked almost constantly. A weird part of him really liked the smell. Luffy didn’t seem to care either, and Sanji often paced the house with an ash tray in hand as he discussed things with Luffy or Usopp or got stuck on the phone for ages, yelling at someone Usopp only knew as “shitty old man.” 

 

Sanji didn’t seem able to talk on the phone and stand still, which Usopp was a little entertained by. As soon as the cook’s phone rang, he was on his feet and walking around, always,  _always_  lighting a cigarette when he answered. 

 

After about a week with those two, Usopp was already becoming familiar with their routines. Well, he didn’t know if he could call them routines, per se. They were more like habits. 

 

Neither of them had any sort of sleeping schedule at all. Sometimes Usopp would find them both awake when he got up for work at five in the morning, sitting on the metal stools by the kitchen counter that formed a sort-of bar, creating the only real barrier between the designated space for the kitchen and the rest of the large room. They’d have beers in hand, and they would be delirious and full of laughter, the ash tray next to them chock full of crushed cigarette butts. 

 

Even at five in the morning, when Usopp stood with them, drinking his first of many, many coffees of the day while they downed their booze before he had to run out the door, their laughter was infectious.

 

Sometimes he’d find them both passed out on the couches when he came home around nine in the evening. In either occurrence, they were always surrounded by plates that must’ve been covered in delicious food at one point, but Usopp could never guess what’d been on them, as there were only crumbs left. Luffy never let anything go to waste. 

 

Luffy and Sanji were both a little unreal. They could command the attention of a room upon their arrival, and they could vanish just as quickly. Sanji worked long hours at some fancy restaurant that Usopp could probably never afford, and he rarely stayed still for too long. From what Usopp could tell, Sanji couldn’t handle his hands being idle. 

 

And Luffy… Luffy would sometimes leave for days and come back looking like he tripped and fell down a mountain. 

 

And he always came back with a fat load of cash, usually shoved in his pockets—a stack so fat that it didn’t even fit in his wallet. Usopp had raised his eyebrows when Luffy had thrown open the door one day, trudged over to the kitchen counter, sat down on one of the stools, and pulled fistfuls of money from his pockets, smoothing the bills out on the countertop, slowly counting them. He was seemingly awful at math, judging by his speed and efficiency with the task. 

 

“What the hell do you do for a living?” Usopp had asked, his legs hanging over the armrest of the love seat he was spread over. 

 

Luffy had looked over his shoulder at him and smiled, his lip cracked right through the very center, still high contrast in bright red. “A lot of different things.” 

 

Maybe Usopp didn’t want to know. 

 

Luffy’s lip still hadn’t healed yet a couple days later when the three of them were sitting around in the mid-afternoon, drinking beers and playing music off Usopp’s old laptop that he’d put on the coffee table. Usopp had made the mistake of informing Luffy that it was possible to modify his scooter to make it faster, and Luffy was way too enthusiastic over the idea, and Usopp hadn’t planned on signing himself up for anything, what the hell, and Sanji was laughing at his misfortune as he lit a new cigarette from his regular spot on one of the barstools when there was a loud knock at the door. 

 

Well, it wasn’t really a knock. It was more of a pounding. More like someone was kicking the door. The three of them stopped talking and looked towards the front of the room at the big wooden door. 

 

“Usopp, you answer it,” Luffy said, sitting on the counter, swinging his dangling legs a little. 

 

“Why? You answer it!” Usopp protested from the couch. 

 

“You’re closer! Also, you’re the newest, so you have to.” 

 

Sanji snorted as he listened to Luffy’s reasoning, his hair hanging over his face as he looked down at his phone, his cigarette still burning in the ash tray, momentarily abandoned as he typed a message to an unknown receiver. 

 

“Why wouldn’t you wanna open the door?” Luffy asked, sitting back. “It could be anyone. None of us knows who it is! Maybe it’ll be a gameshow host and they’ll hand you a million dollars.” 

 

The heavy knocking that rattled the entire door continued, growing ever louder. Usopp ignored Luffy, not even bothering with a response, and he stood and walked to the door and wished there was a peephole. He took a deep breath, hoped for a million dollars, and opened the door. 

 

As soon as the door was open, a large sapling potted in a bright teal ceramic pot was thrust into his arms. 

 

“Jesus, about time! Did you trip and fall five times on your way to the door?—Here, take this.” 

 

He almost dropped it, totally unprepared. His vision was flooded with green and orange. 

 

“Hey! You  _shithead_ , you were supposed to help me move today! Where the hell were you!” A heated redhead stepped around him and into their living room, and she stood next to Usopp in the open doorway, and he shifted his weight, suddenly holding what looked like a small orange tree. 

 

Luffy’s eyes widened as he saw her. “Oh, shit! Was that today?” 

 

Usopp watched her hands curl into fists.

 

“Yes! You stupid idiot! I called you and your phone wasn’t even turned on! You told me you had a ‘friend’ with a car that could help me move, and I had to convince some  _random guy_  to drive me! Do you know how dangerous that is these days? I had to get a ride with a fucking stranger, who, by the way, you owe some gas money to.” 

 

Usopp looked over his shoulder, back out at the porch. It looked like she’d shoved her entire wardrobe into giant trash bags. There were… a lot of trash bags. He looked back at her. Her hair was so long—longer than his, even. And it was so orange. The same color as the little fruits on the tree he was holding. 

 

Usopp realized he was probably the friend with the car Luffy had told her about.

 

He could hear Luffy’s voice rising a little. “I lost my phone, I’m sorry! I thought today was Thursday! Here, here, I have, like, uh, twenty bucks, will that cover it? The gas, I mean?”

 

She snatched the twenty dollar bill from his hand almost before he could offer it to her, and she folded it and put it in the back pocket of her jeans and crossed her arms over her chest. “I’ll make sure he gets it. I don’t know how the hell you went this long thinking it was Thursday. Are you always this lost?”

 

Usopp shifted his weight again and tried to roll his shoulders a little. That tree was heavy. Why the hell was he still holding it? He walked over to the couch and gently placed it on the floor by the coffee table. 

 

Sanji slapped his phone down on the counter and grabbed his cigarette, jumping out of his seat. 

 

“Uh—let me help you with all these boxes—you’re moving in here? Ignore the dumbfuck, you’ll love it here,” Sanji grinned at her, slipping past her to grab half her bags, and he glared at Luffy as he balanced several boxes and bags in both arms, his cigarette at home between his lips. “Help her carry her shit in, asshole.” 

 

Usopp looked over at her, and she caught his eye as she leaned against the couch’s armrest, clearly not intending to do too much work in the very immediate future. 

 

“Who’re you?” he asked. 

 

“Oh, sorry. My name’s Nami. That idiot over there—“ she nodded towards Luffy, who was piling several trash bags in his arms, “— convinced me to move in here, I don’t know how, but he did, so here I am.”   

 

Usopp smiled at her. “No, that makes a lot of sense, actually.” 

 

She returned his expression. “Nice to meet you.” 

 

“You too.” 

 

Usopp, Luffy, and Sanji all helped her move her belongings upstairs, and she picked the room across from Usopp’s because it had a south-facing window for her tree, which Sanji was able to identify as a calamondin, which impressed Nami, which was about the point that Sanji fell completely in love probably, by the look of it. 

 

The dynamic changed a bit.

 

Nami fit in like she’d been there forever. She was rational and wild all at the same time. She was a splash of color, as bright and saturated as Sanji and Luffy. She always smelled good, always looked good, it was a little unnerving, and when she laughed, Sanji melted. 

 

Sanji's admiration was entertaining and exasperating.

 

Nami had been sitting on the other end of the couch he’d sank into when Sanji walked by, sipping something that looked fruity and fucking tasty, and he had an extra drink in his hand, which he held out to Nami, raising his eyebrows with a smile, and she took it with a grin and tried it and threw her head back. 

 

“So good.” 

 

Usopp had never seen Sanji look so pleased with himself. 

 

“Where’s mine?” he asked, only joking, not really caring.

 

Sanji narrowed his eyes at him, and Usopp was a little intimidated, yeah, maybe, but then Sanji nodded towards the countertop. “I’m not bringing yours to you, you can kiss my ass.” 

 

Usopp turned his head and looked and sure enough, there was another drink up there with a green straw in it and he almost laughed. What the hell. 

 

Sanji went back to the kitchen to start on lunch and Usopp glanced over at Nami. 

 

She winked at him. “You’re welcome.” 

 

“Oh, whatever, maybe he’s covering up his love for me by throwing himself at you,” Usopp countered quietly, ducking down a bit, obviously not wanting Sanji to hear him over in the kitchen. 

 

“I bet you’re right,” she said, nodding, sipping her drink, her shirt slipping a little further off her shoulder, nearly halfway down her arm, and her bra was apparently pretty lacy.

 

“You’re kind of a heartbreaker,” he told her, grinning. 

 

She laughed a little and looked over the back cushion at Sanji, walking in circles around the kitchen, juggling several tasks at once. He was stuck in his own world. He probably wouldn’t have heard them if they were yelling at this point. 

 

“You think so?” Nami asked from behind her drink, still smiling. 

 

Out of all of them, it was Nami that Usopp had the easiest time talking to. 

 

 

* * *

 

 

Most of the faculty was still hovering in the hallway as Robin strode into the auditorium, taking a seat several rows in, slightly to the right of the podium.  Her seemingly random choice of seating was actually quite intentional, however; from these seats, she had a sweeping view of everyone who entered the auditorium.

 

Robin's halcyon composure gave her the appearance of disinterest, but on the contrary, she was quite amused as she observed everyone unhurriedly streaming into the moderately sized auditorium, gradually filling the seats.  The diversion of watching people was a pastime she had always thoroughly enjoyed. 

 

Most of her colleagues were bleary-eyed and yawning, clutching onto large cups and thermoses of coffee for dear life.  Perhaps it was a little masochistic for the university to arrange a faculty meeting at seven in the morning a week before classes started, but to see so many adults in one place who couldn't quite get their minds churning this early in the morning was honestly quite funny.

 

It didn't make them bad or irresponsible people—but it did appeal to her sense of humor.

 

Robin inwardly smiled as she heard a man's loud, booming laughter ring out above the tired murmurs and general din of the room.  Although the two of them had never spoken directly, she instantly recognized to whom it belonged.   In fact, Robin was certain anyone who had been in the same room as Cutty Flam for more than five minutes would probably be able to pick his unmistakeable laugh out of a crowd.  

 

Her gaze swept across the room, searching for the source of the jovial laughter.  It didn't take her long to spot the blue-haired man; he was impossible to miss, towering almost a head above nearly everyone else.  

 

Unlike the majority of the faculty filling the auditorium, he was lively and cheerful.  Grinning energetically, he greeted a few other professors Robin knew were affiliated with the engineering department.  She noted that they were all guarded in their replies, their reservedness all the more apparent when compared to his vivacity.

 

But, regretfully, their behavior was wholly unsurprising.  Genius was sometimes regarded with admiration.  More often, however, people seemed to fear it as though it were some kind of contagious disease.  Then again, it was human nature to fear what it didn't understand.

 

Her eyes lingered on the tall man a few moments longer, until a blonde woman wearing a rather short skirt and tall high heels approached Robin, greeting her with a disdainful glare.  This woman was Califa, a professor in the business department.

 

Robin nodded at her politely, the corners of her mouth slightly upturned.  

 

Califa scowled as she sat down next to Robin, crossing her legs as she irritably pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose.  “I can't believe all of these teachers, avoiding sitting in the first couple rows.  They're even worse than the students.”

 

Robin glanced back over her shoulder, noticing all of the seats were already filled.  “You're right.  It seems this is the furthest you can sit from the front now.”

 

“Why do you think I'm sitting here?” Califa asked, not bothering to hide her open hostility.

 

Robin was unfazed; she was used to Califa's antagonistic nature.  She did find it rather funny that the stormy blonde was chastising everyone else for sitting in the back first when she was trying to do the same thing, but she would keep the contradiction to herself.

 

"These meetings are always such a waste of time."

 

"Why do you say that?"

 

Professor Califa raised an eyebrow. "What could an all-faculty meeting possibly accomplish?  My department has nothing to do your... history department,” she said, pronouncing the words with open disdain.

 

"That's true, but we're all a part of the same university.  It's likely more efficient for them to go over the things that affect all of us," Robin pointed out.

 

“Of course I had to sit next to the only person in this room who isn't upset about being here," she huffed, crossing her arms.  "If they want to discuss new policies and budgets, they should just send us a memo.”

 

Robin smiled faintly at her colleague's unabashed unpleasantness.  They were on speaking terms only because history tended to fill in anywhere that had open classrooms, whether it was the business and technology center, the arts and music hall, or even the science and engineering building at the edge of campus—where, interestingly enough, Robin would be teaching one of her classes this semester.

 

A loud hum resounded across the large space, accompanied by a rickety screen descending from above the stage.  A moment later, a projector flickered on, displaying an overly-stylized PowerPoint presentation with a basic outline of the meeting agenda.

 

A woman in her mid-sixties—Tsuru, the assistant dean—approached the podium and announced that the meeting was about to start.  As she launched into a lengthy speech that was probably supposed to inspire motivation, Robin discreetly shifted her gaze to some of her co-workers, who all seemed to be fighting a losing battle with drowsiness.

 

The first topic was about the financial state of affairs. All of their budgets would be severely reduced—never a tremendous surprise, it seemed to happen every year. 

 

The next topic was about the faculty being required to maintain a more professional appearance.  Tsuru explained that too many teachers had been showing up in overly casual clothes, and they felt it was damaging to the appearance of the school.  How funny that they were worried about such a thing.

 

Then, teachers who had been tenured were announced, accompanied by tawdry PowerPoint slides with photographs of the smiling professors taken in ill-lighting.  New teachers were welcomed.  Other staffing changes were discussed.  

 

Califa was completely correct when she said this all could have been done in a memo.

 

"The last matter I'd like to discuss is the textbooks you've been selecting for your courses.  As you should recall, at our last few meetings, I've talked to you about the textbooks published by Toey.”

 

Califa snorted quietly.  “That old woman is still trying to badger us about this?” she muttered under her breath, just loudly enough for Robin to hear her.  

 

“Toey has been gracious enough to approach several of our professors to co-author upcoming editions in a wide variety of subjects,” Tsuru continued.  “To show our appreciation, Dean Garp, the executive committee and I strongly encourage you to consider switching to one of their books next semester, if you haven't already made the switch."

 

Robin's eyes narrowed slightly.  Califa let out another breathy hum of disapproval.

 

“I get it if you want us to use books one of the teachers here helped write,” a loud voice called out, rising about the crowd, “but even if there are a couple of good ones, Toey has a lot of really awful stuff.”

 

Once again, Robin recognized Cutty Flam's voice as soon as he began to speak.  She glanced over in the direction where she knew he had sat, inwardly smiling as she saw him rise to his feet.  His tie had already been loosened, the knot resting somewhere near his sternum, with his top two buttons undone.

 

"The new biochemistry books have things that were proven wrong in the eighties,” Professor Flam continued.  “Their computer engineering books ignore most operating systems.  All of their upper level math books I've looked at are so confusing, I can barely follow the examples—and I'm already super good at solving the problems!  And as for their robotics engineering books... They read like they were written for middle schoolers.  They only discuss the most basic principles and beginner's applications, even in their so-called 'advanced' edition.  It'd bore the students to death if we taught out of that book."

 

Tsuru frowned, the lines around her mouth deepening.  "I'm not exactly sure why you're checking out books that aren't even topics you teach, Professor..."

 

"Toey's textbooks are super expensive as well!” he continued.  “Some of the brand new editions cost twice as much as what the more popular publishers charge."

 

"Once the books have been in circulation a semester or two, the students can purchase used copies.  Not to mention they can sell the books at the end of the semester."

 

"How is that good for the students?  'Oh, this book is five hundred dollars, but I can sell it for eighty at the end of the semester so it's okay.'  There are already plenty of actual quality textbooks in circulation.  There's just no reason for it."

 

The crowd was starting to murmur in annoyance.  From the words and phrases Robin could pick out, the disapproval mostly seemed to be over Cutty Flam extending the length of the meeting, or over the professor himself—not actually words giving consideration for his argument.

 

"Well, Professor Flam—" Tsuru started.

 

“It's Fra—” he cut in.

 

" _Professor_.  We are certainly not forcing you to use Toey's textbooks.  However, since they are working with a number of our teachers, we wanted to return the favor."

 

"Favor?  This isn't your neighbor watering your plants while you're out of town.  They're running a  _business_.  If they're not supplying us with the best product, no one should buy it."

 

Califa made a small hum of irritation. "Even that idiot makes a good point there." She glanced over upon the absent response and almost sputtered aloud as Robin slowly rose to her feet and gently cleared her throat.

 

"Assistant Dean,” Robin called out, her voice loud enough to be heard above the crowd while still remaining calm.  “You must admit, such strong encouragement from the executive committee puts a lot of pressure on the professors."

 

Tsuru's frown deepened as her gaze shifted to Robin.

 

"We are not trying to pressure anyone into anything,” Tsuru said flatly.

 

"I'm not trying to imply you are—but nevertheless, it does make everyone, particularly newer professors, feel compelled to consider Toey's books above the rest."

 

"It is not our intention to do so.  You are all allowed to use whichever textbooks you wish, it is simply something we're mentioning."

 

"If that's the case, then the words you used—'strongly encourage,' I believe they were—are terribly misleading.  Also, Professor Flam brings up a very valid point, about the inferiority of their publications."  She turned her head in his direction.  "In addition to the issues with the science texts he pointed out, there are glaring inconsistencies in many of the history texts.  Some of them are complete anachronisms.  Others simply have omissions of essential events."

 

She watched him as she continued to speak.  His eyes were wide, mouth slightly agape, as he stared back at her.  Then a wide, unfettered grin began to spread across his face.

 

Inexplicably pleased by the reaction, Robin turned back to the assistant dean.

 

"That is indeed concerning, if that's true," Tsuru replied with a forcibly steady tone, narrowing her eyes.  "Thank you for bringing these items to my attention."

 

"But I didn't bring it to your attention," Robin replied coolly. "Professor Flam was the one who pointed it out."

 

Tsuru clenched her jaw, nodding her head politely.  "Yes, you're correct.  Thank you as well, Professor Flam."

 

Robin returned to her seat, noticing that Cutty Flam was staring at her once again, face plastered with a goofy grin.  She unintentionally returned the smile; the silly look on his face was just too much.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Sanji sucked hard on his cigarette, giving it several long puffs, smoke hanging around his face, burning down the tobacco past the first little band of fire retardant. 

 

Five or six years ago, he didn’t have to tend to his cigarette like it was a fucking responsibility to keep it lit; there was no such thing as a ‘fire safe cigarette.’ Now, if he didn’t keep track of his shit, his cigarette would simply go out. It would stop burning. Completely. Halfway through the damn thing. And it had to be relit, which, eugh, tasted awful.  And it wasn’t like the cigarettes themselves were actually ‘fire safe.’ They still caught things on fire.  Like, for example, his entire ash tray in his bedroom back at Zeff’s place a few years ago.  Fortunately, he’d walked into his room in time to see the whole ash tray basically aflame and he had slightly panicked and poured his iced tea on the smoldering pile of butts, and black ashy sludgy iced tea goop had gotten all over his bed and the floor, but. The apartment hadn’t burnt down. So. 

 

Fuck, where the fuck was the bus? 

 

Sanji pinched his cigarette between two fingers and pulled it away from his mouth. There was virtually no breeze, other than the occasional gusts of air from the cars speeding by the bus stop where he was still fucking waiting. 

 

Did he miss the goddamn bus? 

 

The sun was really beating down. He wiped sweat forming at his hairline away with the back of his hand. Several cars along the road started honking urgently at an old beat up Pontiac that wasn't moving forward at the green light.

 

He pulled out his phone and cupped his hand around the screen and squinted at it, trying to read the time beneath the glare. 

 

Fuck, maybe he  _was_  late. 

 

He’d dicked around in the back of the kitchen after his shift was over—he didn’t normally work day shifts, and he had ended up talking to a couple employees he didn’t see very often, and, god damn it—

 

Did he really miss the bus? 

 

Sanji’s cigarette was finally reduced to its butt, and he dropped it and ground it into the concrete beneath his shoe and wiped a bead of sweat from the tip of his nose. 

 

The cigarette hadn’t even been enjoyable. Smoking in that balmy late-August air, with all that humidity—it was like being in an oven and breathing smoke and, ugh, it dried him out and made him so thirsty and god fucking  _damn it_ , he missed the bus, didn’t he. 

 

Sanji turned and looked up at the sign above the building he was standing in front of. It was a bar. And it was open. And it was really fucking hot outside, and his chef’s uniform wasn’t necessarily breezy. 

 

It would be an hour before the bus showed up again. 

 

Sanji strode into the dark, blessedly air conditioned establishment. 

 

It was still only the middle of the afternoon so there weren't a lot of people inside.  Not a big surprise. 

 

He took a seat at the counter, his eyes scanning the line of beers on tap. Gross, really gross, maybe tolerable if he was desperate, gross, sick, and, yeah, so he was going with something bottled, then.  He ordered a Belgian he'd never heard of before—but it was something other than a Budweiser, so that was a win—and let his eyes drift to the row of TV screens along the wall.

 

One screen was playing some kind of MLB season recap show, two were showing the same wrestling match, and the fourth was golf. Cool. 

 

He didn't know what to do with his hands because he couldn't smoke, and he didn't have anywhere else to focus his eyes, so he watched the top twenty scenes from the last season of The Major League Baseball Show and sucked on his beer with his elbow on the countertop and his chin resting in the crook of his hand.

 

Someone walked up behind him and ordered a Sam Adams. In the middle of a sweltering afternoon? Gross. 

 

Sanji caught a flash of short green hair in his periphery, and he turned his head just slightly, his lips still around the mouth of his Belgian. He looked the guy up and down while he waited for his drink. 

 

He seemed… oh, wait, okay. This prick, he—

 

“Hey, I know you,” Sanji said for some fucking reason as he pulled the bottle from his mouth—why the hell did he just initiate conversation with this asshole? What—what was wrong with him today? He cleared his throat a little and shifted his gaze away from… 

 

Fuck, what was this guy’s name? It was something… really fucking ridiculous… Z… Oh—hah—that was it—his name was  _Zoro_. 

 

“Do you?” Zoro asked finally, a crease forming in his brow as he stared Sanji down. The bartender set his pint glass down on the countertop with a loud  _thud_. 

 

“Yeah, uh, we had a couple classes together last year, didn't we?” Did this dumbshit not recognize him at all? 

 

“Hell if I know.” Zoro took a long swig from his glass mug. 

 

“You—okay, well, whatever, you and I have had multiple classes together,” Sanji muttered. 

 

“Good to know.”

 

Sanji shifted his position in the bar stool, rubbing his mouth and unclenching his jaw, his legs suddenly feeling restless. His fingers tightened around the sweating bottle of beer.

 

For some reason, Zoro hovered next to him for a moment, his eyes fixed on a recap of a failed base-stealing attempt.

 

Cool, be fucking awkward. 

 

“Are you, uh, here with people?” Sanji asked.

 

Why the fuck, okay, was he  _interviewing_  him now? Sanji occupied his stupid idiot mouth with his beer, which was almost gone already somehow. 

 

“Nah.”

 

“Waiting for people?” 

 

Was he  _still fucking talking_  to this idiot? 

 

Zoro shook his head from side to side. “How about you?” 

 

“Nope,” Sanji replied, forcing his gaze to lock onto one of the TV screens again. Golf. Golf would get him out of this. If Sanji would just shut up and disengage and focus on golf, Zoro would probably leave soon enough. 

 

Instead, Zoro fucking sat down by him, leaving one empty stool between them. 

 

Awesome, great. Perfect. Golden. 

 

Sanji remembered the classes they’d had together well enough, even if Zoro apparently didn’t. They weren’t the easiest of classes, but they were manageable. Zoro had been a thorn in his side, always asking the dumbest questions, slowing the class down, and, okay, Sanji didn’t mind that Zoro asked questions, but couldn’t he wait until after class to ask shit that could be solved with common sense? He was always late, and disruptive, and he fell asleep half the time and, fuck, how  _annoying_ —

 

“Why the hell are you sitting in a bar drinking when the sun is still out, anyway?” Zoro asked abrasively.

 

“Missed the bus,” Sanji said, succinct as he could be. “And what're  _you_  doing at a bar right now?”

 

“Long story,” Zoro replied simply, raising the pint glass to his lips.

 

“Give me the short version, then.”

 

“Freak sewage accident.”

 

“What?”

 

“You said give you the short version.”

 

“That's too short,” Sanji barked, curling his toes in his shoes. Fuck this guy, figuratively and deeply. 

 

“I couldn't live in my apartment anymore, so I'm staying with a couple friends that said I could sleep on their couch till I found something else.”

 

“That's, uh... wow.”

 

“I don't really like sitting around there all day. Don't want to get in the way when they're already doing me a favor. So here I am.”

 

“That really fucking sucks,” Sanji said helpfully. 

 

Zoro shrugged. “Shit happens, I guess. It's just a bad time to try to find a place around here. Fall semester. Everybody's moving over.”

 

“Very true.” Sanji thought again about how the clouds had essentially parted and bathed him in glowing sunlight as the heavens bequeathed him with that boarding house. It was  _right next_  to the school, even. He’d basically won the lottery of housing rentals. 

 

There was even still that one open room upstairs. Someone else could potentially also strike gold. Someone like—

 

Nope. Hell no. Sanji, you’re a huge fucking idiot, don’t do anything fucking stupid—

 

“I even tried to see about moving into dorms,” Zoro added. “As terrible as that'd be.”

 

“Tried to?”

 

“Yeah. Apparently they're full, unless someone moves out. Maybe that's good, though. I really don't want to try that.”

 

“Don't blame you. You had your own apartment before?”

 

“Nah, roommates.” Zoro's eyes stayed glued to the TV as he spoke. “They found another place to live, though.”

 

“Unfortunate.”

 

He nodded. “And it's sort of hard to get an apartment on your own.”

 

“Tell me about it.” Sanji inhaled deeply, the cool, filtered air of the bar filling his lungs. A very, very familiar and faint prickle of craving flooded the back of his mind. A cigarette sounded incredibly good after the beer he was finishing, but, no, it’d hardly been twenty minutes, calm down. Sanji briefly daydreamed up a fantasy about indoor smoking in public establishments. 

 

Sanji did actually pity Zoro just a tiny bit. 

 

But he needed to keep his mouth shut. Zoro was annoying. He was stupid. Literally, he was a fucking idiot. 

 

“Someone will be renting out a room I can afford eventually,” Zoro shrugged.

 

“You know,” Sanji started.

 

A voice in the back of his head started to scream at him, desperately trying to stop him.

 

“Hm?”

 

“Um.”

 

Do not. Do  _not_  fucking do it, Sanji, you stupid mother fucker. 

 

Sanji rubbed his mouth and eyed his empty beer for a second or two, and he looked back up at Zoro, who was waiting for him to spit it out and, no, Sanji sure as all fucking hell was  _not_  going to—

 

“There’s an open room at my place.” 

 

Sanji, you stupid… you stupid fucking idiot. 

 

“Is there?” 

 

Sanji nodded and rubbed his eyes and his voice actually sounded pained, like someone was twisting his arm, as he responded, “Uh-huh.” 

 

“Is it expensive?” Zoro asked, obviously and mother fucking unfortunately interested. 

 

“Nope,” Sanji said, pithy, folding his hands on the bar, and he felt like he was slowly shoving his own face into a brick wall, just totally fucking smashing it. “Cheap as hell. Right by the school.” 

 

“You may have just fucking saved me. What was your name?” Zoro asked, and Sanji rubbed his face. 

 

He’d lost his mind. He’d just had some kind of seizure. He’d just blacked out and lost all control of himself. Possibly his entire life.

 

“Sanji.” 

 

“Sanji. Okay. Um, can I, uh… come see it, or, uh…” Zoro said slowly, and Sanji’s face was still mashed into his palms. 

 

“Sure. We can take the bus when it gets here in half an hour,” he said, his voice muffled. 

 

“Uh. Great.” 

 

Sanji took a long breath and pushed his hair away from his face, clenching his fingers around it, his elbows pressed hard into the bar under his weight. Fuck.

 

“Yep.” 

 

Damn it.

 

He'd fucked up.

 


	2. September

Heavily-lashed eyes snapped open at the sound of... a crash?What was that?His eyes lingered on the ceiling for a few seconds before he sat upright.  

 

It was early, still really dark, and he glanced over at his clock to check the time—and, oh, he figured out the source of the noise.There was his alarm clock, reduced to a smashed pile of shattered plastic and uncoiling wires on the floor.  

 

He pushed loose strands of blue hair back, frowning at the obliterated appliance.It'd been awhile since he did that—probably the last time he'd actually _needed_ the alarm to wake himself up.He usually didn't have a problem getting up, no matter how little sleep he'd gotten the night before.  

 

Throwing tangled sheets off of his lap, wearing nothing but a pair of briefs, he swung  long, hairy legs over the side of the bed, connecting calloused soles with aging carpeting.Pausing to scratch his equally hairy chest, he realized his shoulders were kind of stiff.  

 

Rising to his feet, he reached large hands upward, stretching out his spine and shoulders; if he stood on the balls of his feet, he could just barely touch his ceiling.It was kind of weird how his muscles felt so knotted; he'd taken it pretty easy the last two weeks.Really, other than going out a couple of times for errands—and one meeting—he'd spent all of his time working on his model project for the next semester.

 

His eyes drifted immediately to the table in the corner of his small bedroom, and a grin spread across his face.A bit eagerly, he picked up the small, slick-looking metal-and-plastic contraption he'd nearly finished the night before.

 

... His contraption that he'd been hunched over, tinkering with and programming, for probably twelve or sixteen hours a day for the last two weeks.

 

Oh.Yeah, _that_ might be why his shoulders were stiff.  

 

Well, hey, he wasn't as young as he used to be.Mid-thirties, huh, how that'd happen. He sure didn't feel that old.He sat down at the single chair in front of the table, admiring his creation.

 

He'd designed it look to like a lion.Well, sort of—it was purposely a little cartoony, and it was small, maybe the size of a beagle.Oh, like the size of a lion cub, that was good, although it had a plastic fringe to represent a mane so it wasn't really supposed to be a cub.But, aesthetics aside—not that he put aesthetics aside, because it was _very_ important it looked _really_ cool—but it was the guts that mattered.

 

Its purpose was to use as a teaching model—and hopefully, to inspire his students.It had a huge variety of functions and processes.Voice-control, audio and video recording capabilities, fully functioning limbs, the ability to shoot small projectiles, and superior command processing abilities.  

 

In fact, that was one of the features he was most excited about—he'd spent a ton of time programming it to be able to make the small robot recognize and process certain commands that weren't pre-programmed, to a certain extent.He felt strongly like the next frontier to cover was AI.  

 

To make something that could take data it'd previously taken in and process a new command from it—it was really, really thrilling. To learn from _process of deduction?_ Only a few creatures on the planet were capable of that!

 

He'd keep tweaking the little lion bot through the year, but at least it was enough to show off to the class soon.He wasn't even sure how well it'd work, but it was already able to combine certain commands.Who knew what it might learn.

 

He'd called it the _Lion Gang Champion_.He thought it was a super cool name.

 

What a great accomplishment for the break.He'd heard some of the other professors talk about family vacations and house projects and couples getaways—but look at what he was able to do!He couldn't wait to share it with his new group of students.

 

Realizing he should probably start getting ready, he made his way to the bathroom, grabbing a bottle of shaving cream.He stared at his reflection as he shook the bottle and squeezed some out into his hand.Yeah, there were maybe some lines around his eyes, around his mouth—but he still looked pretty good, he had to say.Slathering the white foam across his face, he started shaving; his facial hair would always stand the test of time. He put a lot of work into it.Immaculate precision with every stroke, tracing along the lines of his carefully sculpted goatee.  

 

When he was nearly done, he cranked on the hot water for a shower.

 

The room was filling up with steam by the time he kicked off his briefs and dipped his head under the bar and stepped into the shower. 

 

His shower curtain was a map of the world with every country labeled. He had it completely memorized.  

 

His brain tended to map things out on its own, assigning values and places to each piece of information, and sometimes he couldn't help but think of things as schematics. Like his world map shower curtain—on top of knowing exactly where each country was, he also knew that country's GDP and standing point in the global economic scale of things, and he mentally catalogued each country's largest trade export—its contribution to the world market. 

 

Name, place, importance, function. 

 

Not to mention its changes—everything was constantly being updated and reorganized.Technology and countries alike.

 

Couldn't keep shampoo out of his eyes to save his life, though. 

 

With his face directly under the shower head, leaned over with his palms pressed flat against the walls, he thought about his alarm clock that he'd broken. Again. 

 

See, he used to go through those damn clocks at a rate that one might classify as... _alarming?_

 

He broke out laughing as he rinsed the last of the shampoo from his hair and his eyeballs. 

 

But back to the clocks themselves—despite being super conducive for bad puns, the fact remained that it wasn't exactly frugal to be purchasing ten or twelve a year.This was a _problem_ and he was an engineer, after all, and an inventor, and an all-around super-problem-solving genius and he could do what he did best and come up with a _solution_. 

 

Scrubbing his body, he mentally calculated (judged) the amount of force exerted on the snooze button of his digital alarm clock and how to apply an appropriate level of resistive force to counteract the impact. 

 

Some kind of platform with something for shock absorption (like a padded piece of wood with springs) would probably work.But, wait.  

 

He reworked the  calculations in his head as he rinsed away the soap.There were certain vulnerabilities in particular portions of the plastic—they weren't exactly made to withstand a turbulent force—so maybe it'd help if he reinforced the clock itself in addition to the snooze shield.Which would be easy to do, now that it was already in several pieces. Maybe he'd paint it. That would also be cool. 

 

When he stepped out of the shower, a towel around his waist, he padded through his empty apartment and hung around the kitchen, debating on breakfast but ultimately deciding to grab a coke for now.Never much cared for coffee.He pulled two of the red and white cans out of the fridge—four or five fridge packs and some loose cans in the door were about all that was in there—and started to get dressed.

 

His apartment was a compilation of storage space and fold-out surfaces, because sometimes he needed ten or twelve table tops, and other times he just needed a normal, functional living room and bedroom.Something stylish and functional, something that he could be proud of.  

 

He'd custom-built almost all of his furniture—because really, beneath a couch was a perfect space for storage drawers, and a coffee table should have a top that folds out and expands in case a bigger surface was needed, and there was no reason a cabinet shouldn't extend right up to a ceiling to take advantage of the space.And hey, when he made it himself, he could give it some pretty awesome embellishments.  

 

Returning to his bedroom, he rummaged in some of the drawers that contained actual for-real clothes, not just wires and parts, and tossed a pair of briefs, socks and trousers—yes, _trousers_ —onto his bed before he dove into his closet for a shirt. 

 

The dress code was really getting out of hand.

 

His shirts all had to have collars now? And _button_ up the front? And all the buttons actually had to be _buttoned_ , all the way up to his _neck?_

 

He was required to _wear ties to meetings?_

 

Like that had anything to do with learning.

 

Taking one last glance at the kitchen, he officially made the decision to grab something on the way to work instead of trying to throw together a breakfast here.He snatched up the coke he'd laid out by the door earlier, gave one last wistful look at the Lion Gang Champion—okay, no, he had to make a few adjustments before he brought it in, he'd leave it at home—and went on his way.

 

The sky was a hazy blue-gray while he sat in his car in the parking lot, wolfing down three breakfast sandwiches and two hash browns. The sun wasn't up just yet. It was so quiet at this time of day. 

 

For twenty plus minutes, he sat alone in his car, in the empty parking lot, waiting for the janitor to unlock the doors to the science and engineering building.When his coke was gone, he reached into the back, digging into the half-empty pack he knew was behind the passenger seat.It was still a little cold, but it'd get pretty hot in the car now that the sun was out.He'd take the box in with him.They'd probably be gone by the time he went home.

 

Snapping open the fresh can, he turned up the volume on his car speakers. 

 

When he saw the man in the green jumpsuit unlocking the front doors, he turned his car off and grabbed his bag stuffed with papers and folders—he'd meant to organize that thing before the school year started, super serious—and he lugged it over his shoulder and headed inside, the heels of the loafers he fucking hated dragging along the parking lot asphalt. 

 

The halls were empty and he hardly lingered. He passed the Department Head office and the staff room, pausing for the briefest moment to glance inside, noting they'd added a new orange sofa in there. Er, wait. Huh. Maybe it wasn't new. Hm.

 

He continued walking and finally made it to his classroom. _His_ classroom. His super kickass best-one-in-the-whole-university classroom. 

 

All around the outside walls, on top of the counters that lined the room, and some even hanging from the ceiling, bizarre-looking gadgets and toys and devices all sat on display—creations from his past students. Some of them weren't necessarily useful in daily activities, but they were all, without a doubt, _super_ cool. 

 

Like the TV-B-Gone, an invention made by a student of his three years ago. It emitted 209 different turn-off codes for nearly every television. It was a little gray button on a keychain. It looked like a garage-door opener and it could turn off every television in a crowded bar. So awesome. 

 

Or the Blow Bot, made by a student five years back. He had gently tried to encourage his student, who was very intelligent, obviously, to use a different name for her creation, but she'd been a fan of the alliteration and couldn't understand why he wasn't into it. 

 

The Blow Bot was an inflatable robot. It was capable of simple commands, controlled by radio, with built-in walkie-talkie capabilities. The material used made it potentially extremely affordable and marketable. He did not discuss marketing with her any further. He was proud of her invention. Extending robotics beyond the reach of the wealthy and financially stable. He was extremely proud. 

 

Last year, a student of his had created a flying alarm clock. As in, someone would actually have to get up out of bed and catch it to turn it off. He'd looked upon it in horror and given his student a super grade. Of course! After all, he couldn't let his own personal biases interfere in the classroom. It was a great invention, and a great use of robotic technology, despite being a nightmare-come-to-life. 

 

And today was the start of another semester. New classes, new faces, new young people who wanted to learn cool stuff about science and mechanics and engineering and—

 

He grinned as the first of his new students started filing in, yawning loudly, probably inwardly questioning whatever possessed them to take such an early class. He stood up against the side wall towards the back of the class, out of the way, and he waited until it seemed like everyone was in attendance and glancing around the room. 

 

He crossed his arms over his chest and walked slowly to the front of the classroom, and he watched over twenty sets of tired eyes focus on him and realize that they were staring directly at their professor, and wondering how the hell they'd missed a man that was well over six feet tall with blue hair that made up several inches of his overall height. 

 

Ah, the kids were always super hilarious in his early class. 

 

"Good morning!" he said loudly, and nearly everyone flinched at the sound of his rough, scratchy voice booming out towards them. Nobody responded. Off to a good start. 

 

"I'm going to skip over the whole course outline and syllabus deal, because you can read that on your own time, and you'll all get to know each other over the semester so we're not doing introductions. Take out your notebooks and pay attention, you're going to want to write a lot of this down. Unless you have some kind of super eidetic memory. But, then, well, there aren't any true, proven cases of anyone really having a photographic memory. So really, if you think about it, you're probably just being lazy. In which case you won't do well in this class." 

 

He had begun scribbling across the whiteboard as he spoke, and when he glanced over his shoulder, he saw most of his students still fumbling to find a pen or the right notebook. 

 

"Most of my lectures will be available for download in PDF format from the school website," he said, turning. "So, just write down what you think is the most important stuff. But, well, it's all important, so that's up to you. I guess, if I'm taking the time to actually write it down, you probably should, too." 

 

His students were rubbing their eyes and stifling their yawns and trying to see past him in order to copy what he'd scribbled down. 

 

**_τ_** = **_H_** ( ** _q_** ) ** _q_** ¨ + **_c_** ( ** _q_** , **_q_** ˙, **_f_** _ext_ )

 

He stepped aside and nodded to the board. "That's the equation of motion for a robot mechanism. It can be written a few ways, but who cares, this'll work for now." 

 

He smiled a little at the frowns in his students' faces, at the mere fact that they were writing equations already, five minutes into their earliest class on their first day. 

 

"Uh…" 

 

His eyes drifted to a student in the back who was raising his hand a little. He nodded at him. 

 

"Professor Fla—"

 

"Hey!" he shouted, interrupting his student, dropping his smile and pointing directly at him. 

 

The boy froze.As did the rest of his class.

 

"Let's get one thing straight. I know it's super early in the morning, and you'll all probably forget most of what I'm telling you today, which is fair, it's day number one and it's basically the crack of dawn for you, I get that. But if you remember anything, make sure it's this, because I'm not repeating myself a hundred times—" 

 

His entire class had straightened a little in their seats. He grinned openly at them. 

 

"Forget all the other labels. My name is _Franky._ " 

 

 

* * *

 

 

There was a singular force entirely responsible for removing Usopp from his bed on mornings he didn’t have to work at the coffee shop at the crack of dawn, succeeding where intensely blinding sunlight, all daily responsibilities, and the overwhelming need to piss had all failed.

 

He could be in a straight coma and the smell of Sanji’s cooking would wake him up.

 

Inhaling deeply, using the beckoning scent of a hot breakfast prepared by probably the best fucking chef in the entire country as motivation, Usopp groaned loudly to his empty room and rolled out of bed, and he could feel his hair all over the place when he stood up straight, he didn’t even need to look in a mirror to know he was a few picks away from some kind of half-afro monstrosity, and he pulled/man-handled it back into a very curly ponytail after yanking on some sweatpants he’d spotted on the floor—he smelled them and they were definitely still clean, alright—and he slightly-stumbled down the stairs to the bottom level of the house.

 

Almost all his roommates were there and awake, which was odd for daylight hours. Luffy was missing, but that wasn’t that strange.

 

Sanji was cooking even more—he’d actually already put out a sort of buffet line of breakfast foods along the stretching kitchen countertop that they’d all essentially started using as a bar. Everything looked like the airbrushed food featured in photographs on restaurant menus. Except fancier. Everything was pristine. Usopp already knew it was going to taste good, and it smelled incredible, but aesthetically, Sanji’s cooking was like… His desserts were like supermodel-level compared to regular desserts. They were the high fashion models of the pastry world. Legitimately pretty to look at. Sometimes Usopp almost wanted to take a picture of his meal before he ate it, but that’d be weird, wouldn’t it? Would that be weird?

 

He piled his plate full of breakfast delicacies, and he didn’t know why Sanji was still cooking, Jesus, but sometimes Usopp thought maybe Sanji cooked just because he could. Because that’s who he was. Even after only a month, it was so painfully obvious that Sanji was easily enamored with many people and things, but he’d always return to his first love. And it was enjoyable to watch someone Sanji’s age being so fully engaged in something that was clearly his passion and freaking forte. Usopp couldn’t imagine what it was like to be so damn self-actualized.

 

Either way, it didn’t matter how much food Sanji made in the end. In a house of five hungry, financially-unstable adults, everything got eaten eventually.

 

“Is Luffy gone?” Usopp asked as he slid into a seat across from Nami at the very large and very scuffed cherrywood dining table near the peeling wall. None of the chairs were the same. He’d sat in all six of them and there were two that were respectably close to being actually comfortable.

 

“Yeah, he’s been gone since yesterday, maybe?” Nami said, dipping one of her little dessert donut-looking things in her coffee and taking a small bite. Usopp did not have the level of self control Nami possessed, and he used his fork as a shovel.

 

“How do you guys all know him?” Zoro asked from the couch where he was sitting with a textbook in his lap.

 

Sanji glanced at Nami and Usopp from the kitchen, and the three of them looked back at Zoro, unanimously pausing as a collective.

 

“I met him in the parking lot at the school where he was attempting to reverse-engineer his scooter in the space next to my car.”

 

“He came into my work and ordered over two-hundred dollars worth of food with forty bucks to his name because he thought the prices on the menu were portion sizes.”

 

“Someone tried to steal my laptop bag during a class—literally took it off my desk—and Luffy grabbed it for me before I knew it was gone.”

 

“He seems like a pretty interesting guy,” Zoro said, raising his eyebrows a little at their stories.

 

“He’s…” Sanji began, adding a few extra plates to the buffet line, and Usopp was going to have to go throw up or something because whatever Sanji had just finished looked and smelled incredible and Usopp needed, like, way more room in his stomach. Sanji tapped his chin and looked over at Zoro on the couch, who was watching him from behind the cushion. “He’s a total shithead, but he brought us all here, so we can’t hate him.”

 

Sanji smiled a little and Usopp could see Zoro going back to his text book with a dismissive, “Hm.”

 

Usopp turned his eyes to Sanji almost automatically, and he hid his tiny grin behind his hand. Sanji scowled at the back of Zoro’s head and lit a cigarette, leaning against the kitchen counter.

 

Those two did not get along, and Usopp didn’t understand why Sanji had brought Zoro home with him a few evenings ago in the first place, but the more Usopp was present when they were in the same room, the more he was beginning to guess that Sanji didn’t know either.

 

Apparently they knew each other from the previous year or something, but they certainly weren’t friends. There were times when Usopp could see Sanji physically straining to not lose his shit on Zoro. And, entertaining enough, Zoro was, at times, equally frustrated at Sanji. And to be fair, Sanji was a total fucking prick to Zoro. To continue being fair, Zoro was perfectly capable of handing all of Sanji’s shit back to him. Usopp wasn’t exactly sure why the animosity between them existed, but he wasn’t going to mess with it. He wasn’t the house peacekeeper.

 

Nami caught him watching the exchange, and they matched subtle smiles, both of them leaning over the table to whisper something to each other, but just as Nami was cupping her hand over her mouth to add in some commentary to the scene, the door down the hall clicked open.

 

This shouldn’t have been strange, because that’s where Luffy’s room was—he slept in the basement, and the door to the basement was at the end of the hall, so this was a very normal sound to hear, but. Luffy wasn’t there. Nami and Usopp seemed to realize this at the same time, and they turned in their chairs to see a kid coming out of the extra room down the hall. Usopp had forgotten that room was even there.

 

The stranger had an outrageous cow-licked mop of chocolate-colored bed-head sticking up in a few different directions, and his cheeks and nose were littered with dark freckles, and he was stretching and yawning loudly with his eyes squeezed shut. He looked young. Like, teenager-young.

 

Halfway to the kitchen, standing in front of the stairs, he opened his eyes as he was scratching his chest through the faded t-shirt that he was practically drowning in, and he paused, his mouth still open in a ridiculous frozen yawn. He blinked a couple times and snapped his mouth closed as he looked slightly wide-eyed at the room full of people blatantly staring at him in pregnant silence.

 

“Oh. Um, hi, everyone,” the kid said in a cracking voice.

 

“Hi?” Usopp said, and they were all at a slight loss.

 

“I, uh—“ the kid rubbed his arm, looking around the giant room they were all spread out in.

 

“Who the hell are you?” Zoro asked from the couch in his low and rumbly voice and damn if that wasn’t intimidating. Zoro was a little unintentionally abrasive sometimes. Just very slightly scary. Not scary. Well, a little scary, okay, yeah.

 

“I’m Chopper—I live here. I mean, I moved in. I’ve actually been here a couple days, but I have a weird schedule and, I don’t know, I knew other people lived here, but I haven’t seen you guys until... right now.” He cleared his throat.

 

Chopper was floundering a little bit.

 

“How old are you?” Nami asked, resting her chin on her hand as she leaned on the tabletop.

 

“Seventeen—I graduated, uh, a little early, and I’m starting in the pre-med program at the school…” Chopper said, trailing off a bit, shifting a little as he continued, “Sorry, I just—it smelled really good out here, so I came out to see… I mean, Luffy told me one of you was a chef…?”

 

Chopper was hesitating under the thick silence of being stared at by four different sets of eyes. A few long seconds passed between them all.

 

“Sorry, I can—“

 

Chopper was interrupted by four different waves of questions all hitting him at once.

 

“You’re in the premed program here? Isn’t that, like, really fucking hard?”

 

“So you’re, like, a doctor, then?”

 

“Oh, that’s perfect, I can't afford to go to a doctor.”

 

“Sabaody has a medical program?”

 

Chopper’s dark brown eyes got wider, which was impressive, because they were already huge, and he held his hands up in defense, suddenly almost shouting at them, interrupting them all, “Wow, okay, I’m not a doctor, you idiots!”

 

The group paused and several more second crawled past them.

 

Chopper’s face was getting extremely red, and Usopp could see the backpedalling in his facial features.

 

"Er. I mean.”Chopper faltered a moment.“You're not idiots. I'm sorry. Uh, is Luffy here?"

 

"Nah, he's out.How do you know him?"

 

"I met him on campus, and he showed me around while I was touring the school. I don't even know what his major is, though."

 

Nami laughed.“He doesn’t have a major. He’s not even a student.”

 

Sanji and Usopp both turned their heads towards Nami, and Chopper spoke for the three of them in a shrill voice, “What?” 

 

Nami took another bite of her breakfast and Usopp’s mind was reeling a little. If Luffy wasn’t a student, what the hell was he doing hanging around the campus so much? 

 

“He likes going to the classes,” Nami said, poking at a section of some kind of cherry breakfast pastry. “He thinks they’re interesting.” 

 

Usopp, along with Sanji and Chopper, who were clearly as uninformed as Usopp was, stared at her, utterly blank. 

 

“His grandpa’s the dean.” 

 

“That little shit,” Sanji said, and he looked over at Chopper. “Anyway, welcome. Zoro’s an asshole, but the rest of us aren’t so bad.”

 

“Fuck off,” Zoro muttered, focusing on his book again. 

 

Chopper cleared his throat and smiled a little.

 

**“** So, uh, can I—is it okay if I get breakfast, too?”  

 

“Don't ask, just help yourself,” Sanji said, taking another drag of his cigarette.

 

After loading up a plate that was filled with mostly pastries, Chopper started to head back down the hall, but he sort of stopped next to the table, like he wasn't really sure what he was supposed to do.  

 

“So, what's your first class today?” Nami asked, clearly noticing his confusion.

 

A hint of relief washed over Chopper’s freckled face as he turned toward the table, timidly taking the seat across from Nami.

 

“Um... Differential Calculus with Theory.”

 

“Shit,” Zoro muttered under his breath.

 

“Ah.That sounds kind of hard,” she said.

 

“Yeah, it's the advanced one, too.I'm, um, in the honors program,” Chopper added, a bit haltingly.

 

As much as Usopp wanted to hear about the apparent kid-genius living with them now, he really had to shower and figure out where the hell his first class was, which started in about—forty minutes?Yikes.He'd taken too much time at breakfast.No, that was okay, it was totally worth it and he only regretted he couldn't eat more.

 

Normally Usopp liked how big and sprawling the campus at Sabaody was, with the wide expanses of grass and paths adorned with benches, covering gentle, rolling hills—but at times like this, he sort of wished everything was closer to the parking lot.He made it to the building with seconds to spare, and he slid into a chair near the classroom doorway just as the ancient relic of a professor—Professor Haredas was his name—stood up and started his tremulous introduction to the class. 

 

Feeling someone's gaze on him, Usopp scanned the room until he met a very familiar pair of brown eyes.Nami winked and stuck the tip of her tongue out at him before she turned back to the front of the room.Weird. Really? He was surprised they'd have a class together—what was her major again?Something weather-y.Meteorology... Longer than that, though.Oh yeah.Research meteorology.

 

Okay, maybe it _did_ make sense she'd need to take thermodynamics.

 

As they left, Nami approached him and hooked her fingers into the handle on the side of his backpack, rattling off her first impressions of the class as they walked down the hallway of the science and engineering building.  

 

“There are actual homework assignments!Can you believe it?”

 

“Uh, what do you mean?” Usopp asked, a bit confused.Homework seemed like a pretty normal thing to have? Right?

 

She gave him an incredulous look.“Come on, when's the last time you had to do an assignment out of a _textbook_?It's usually all tests and papers, right?Maybe even short response essays.But chapter problems?”

 

“Oh. I guess I've had a couple of classes like that?”

 

“Really?Maybe I just lucked out.I mean, sure, math classes assign problems like that, I guess—but teachers don't grade your homework, you're just kind of screwed if you don't do it and learn how to solve the shit.”She looked up at him, brushing a loose tendril of hair off of her forehead with her free hand.“But he's actually going to give us a _grade_ on them.I don't know, I'm in shock.”

 

“Yeah. Ugh, stop talking about it, I'm not looking forward to it.”

 

He slowed down as they approached one of the rooms near the end of the hall, by the rear exit.  

 

“What?” she asked, tugging at his backpack.

 

He pointed at the doorway.“My next class is here.”

 

“That's lucky, I don't know if I've ever had two classes so close to each other. Does it start soon?”

 

“Uh, like thirty minutes, I think?” Usopp flipped his phone out of his pocket, confirming the time.“Er, more like forty-five.”

 

“Good, come with me to get coffee then,” she said, pulling the backpack handle one more time.Really, Usopp had never even understood why the damn thing was on there before, but she seemed to be getting pretty good use out of it.

 

“Sure,” he said, because what else could he say, and he let her half-lead him along toward the crappy little coffee-and-sandwich shop that was a short walk away.The coffee was terrible and Usopp fully anticipated drinking a lot of gross lattes from there over the semester. Because convenience was going on win over quality in this case. 

 

Although, he suspected his next class may be enough to keep him him awake, even without a triple-shot of espresso.

 

At first, Usopp wasn't going to take robotics.

 

The engineering program was, well, _hard._ But it was interesting, and it let him learn about all the things he'd been into as a kid. He'd always liked to take things apart and put them back together, or try to build things or do little repairs here and there. Anything that let him get his hands on something and really _do_ something with it.

 

As a teenager, his biggest hobby, other than drawing, might've been tinkering with his old station wagon, since long before he could actually legally drive the thing. Well, really, he was lucky he got to keep it at all—after his mom passed away when he was still a kid, his foster parents could've sold it, could've told him he couldn't hold onto it, even if he did find somewhere else to store it. But the deal was, if it wasn't rotting in their driveway, they didn't care. So, with the help of an—uh, old friend—he found somewhere to keep it and that meant he learned how to maintain a car before he could actually drive one. Being passed from one foster home to the next, eventually, his car kind of seeped through the documented cracks.

 

But, even before his mom's old boat-sized Mercury Grand Marquis Colony Park piece of crap wood-paneled station wagon became his only heirloom from her, he'd liked to work with his hands.

 

Anyway, long story short, when he started college, he had a choice to make. There was art, yes, he really did love to draw, but after he’d turned eighteen, he was on his own—he didn’t have family to fall back on or any kind of security. So that meant he needed money. And he didn’t think he’d turn out being good enough at art to buy a house with it one day, or even pay rent. And mechanical and electrical engineers usually started off with something like a sixty-thousand dollar salary. So.

 

He made sure he kept up enough on all of the complicated math and physics classes he had to take during his first two years so he could get to play around with building and fixing stuff, and hopefully get a job in that someday. It'd be nice to do something he sort of enjoyed for a living, right?

 

But robotics was one of those very niche electives that was _extremely hard_ from what he'd heard, and he never thought he'd take it. There were plenty of other options, anyway.

 

Until he'd had Professor Franky for a class last spring.

 

His first impression of him was that the guy was totally over-the-top. When he started class, it was like he set off a round of fireworks, demanding the attention of anyone and everyone. His presence was larger than life—and with him being probably one of the tallest people Usopp had ever known, he meant it both figuratively and literally.

 

Day one of robotics, Professor Franky, as expected, had burst in like a whirlwind, speaking quickly and animatedly, laying down tons of formulas and information. Usopp had glanced around the room from his spot next to the window in one of the center rows and, okay, thank god, everyone else looked as visibly overwhelmed as he felt, so that was… good?

 

Franky had a way of uniting the classroom in odd ways. In most of Usopp’s other classes, students kept their heads down, writing notes or scrolling their phones in their laps. But Franky had apparently devised a way of formulating genuine camaraderie.

 

His momentum carried them, and without it, Usopp doubted he would’ve been able to keep up. And it wasn’t just that. Franky also encouraged students to work together to solve problems, to ask each other for help, and to collaborate.

 

Because, Franky had said, they were all working towards the same goal.

 

Franky had taken a week to review the basics with them, and at the end of that first week, he’d issued his first formal quiz. However, there was only one quiz—like, one physical piece of paper. The entire class was ordered to work together on it, hand it in together, and receive the same grade.

 

It’d been encouraging that they’d all started out with great grades. Like, maybe they could do this. At the beginning of week two, Franky started talking to them about their projects.

 

“We could probably spend the whole semester just talking about this stuff, but that'd be super boring, so we're going to build some robots.”

 

It was an abrupt transition and Usopp very quickly wondered if he was in over his head.

 

Being in over his head was like his life-long reoccurring idiom, though, so he'd be fine. Probably.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Nami walked up to the front door, her hair pulled up in a high bun because it was damn hot outside, and she propped the big wooden door open and kicked her sandals off as she made a direct line over to the cushy love seat and threw herself down onto it.

 

“Why the hell did you leave the door open like that, were you raised in a barn—“

 

“Shh—just shut up. Shut up and wait twenty seconds,” Nami said, interrupting Zoro before he could finish what he was saying because, frankly, what he was saying was pretty stupid in the first place.

 

Zoro glared at her from the couch, closing the book in his lap, his mouth opening to say something else, but whatever clever little remark he thought he was about to come up with was put on hold when Usopp and Sanji came in the front door, visibly covered in sweat, their shirts were totally soaked, and between them, they were barely managing a huge big screen television.

 

See, when Nami found out Usopp was an engineering student, she'd made a mental note in the back of her head. And a couple weeks later, when she'd heard about a girl giving away a really big and broken television, she knew just who to go to. 

 

Nami pointed to the spot in front of the fire place, and Sanji and Usopp walked it over, both their backs a little bent, straining, and they lowered it to the ground as gently as they could manage, both of them straightening up slowly, breathing heavily. The TV was one of those gargantuan older models, maybe from the early 2000’s or late 90’s, and it was heavy—certainly nothing Nami would be breaking her back over.

 

“You guys got a TV?” Zoro asked, and Nami looked over at him, but before she could say anything, Sanji cut in, lighting a cigarette.

 

“No, it’s a puppy. We talked and decided you were finally responsible enough for one.”

 

Zoro narrowed his eyes at Sanji, gritting his teeth, but he chose to drop it and ask Nami instead, “How’d you get this thing?”

 

“Aw, you’re not going to name it?” — Sanji was being ignored at this point.

 

“Some girl in my class mentioned it. It was free!” Nami grinned, feeling proud of herself.

 

“Free? Why the hell was it free?”

 

“Because it’s broken,” Usopp said, re-tying his ponytail up a bit higher to get all his curls off his neck. “She thinks I can fix it.”

 

“Well, can you?” Zoro asked.

 

“Maybe. Probably not.”

 

“Oh, yes you can,” Nami said, propping her feet up on the coffee table. “It’ll be easy.”

 

“You don’t know shit about televisions, and really, I don’t either, and I don’t know where you’re getting this idea that I can just—“

 

“Usopp!” Nami said over him, pointing at him. “You are a smart and capable individual! Also, just google it, you’ll figure it out.”

 

Usopp faltered, trying his very hardest not to be flattered, but Nami figured he was probably failing, because he sat down next to the television, right on the hardwood floor, and he pulled out his phone and was probably already googling how to fix old tube TVs.

 

“And besides,” Nami grinned, and Usopp looked up at her, “Sanji’s gonna make us drinks, so it’ll be fun anyway.”

 

“He is?” Usopp asked, glancing over at Sanji, who was sitting on one of the metal stools at the bar, ash tray next to him, looking up from his phone at hearing the sound of his name.

 

Sanji’s eyes went from Usopp to Nami, and he processed the conversation he’d only been half-listening to, and with his open, toothy smile, he said to Nami rather than Usopp, “Absolutely.”

 

Sanji made them all drinks and served them in mismatched glasses and cups, even Zoro got one, and they were fruity as hell, he actually put pineapple in it—he cut up a whole pineapple up and put it in their drinks, for god’s sake—and Nami finished hers quicker than she meant to and Sanji, bless him, already had another ready to go by the time she was sucking up the last few drops through her bright green straw.

 

Nami was the only one that got a straw, but nobody else complained.

 

Usopp and Sanji and Nami all took turns showering in between reading up on how older televisions worked and cutting up more fruit to soak in coconut rum—Sanji had good ideas when he was bored—and lounging around in the cushy love seat. Nami drank her second round in the shower.

 

Usopp had made some comment about her heading upstairs with a cup in her hand, and she told him not to knock it until he tried it.

 

Drinking in the shower was _extremely enjoyable._

 

When she came back downstairs, Usopp had a big box of tools sitting in front of the television, and he was wedged behind it, the whole back panel removed, and he was pulling a big circuit board out of the TV when she walked up, her hair still wet, to inspect his progress. He looked up at her and held up the circuit board.

 

“The joints on the heat sink just need to be re-soldered and that should fix it,” Usopp informed her, like she knew what the hell that meant. 

 

“Great job,” she said, patting him on the shoulder, and she sat back down next to Zoro and leaned over a bit to see what he was studying and yeah, nope, she was already sleepy after reading one paragraph, and Zoro gave her a look that clearly said _I hate this shit way more than you ever could_. She left him to his boring homework and chose to sprawl across the other couch instead.

 

After about fifteen minutes of near-silence as Zoro studied and Nami and Sanji listlessly scrolled through their phones, all of them slowly drinking their summery drinks, they all nearly jumped when Usopp suddenly shouted, “Done!”

 

He re-attached the back panel, screwing it in quickly, biting his tongue and keeping his hand steady, and when he was finished, he stood and plugged the big TV into the wall and walked around to the front of it, squatting down to turn it on. He stood back up slowly, hands on his hips as the television pointedly did not turn on.

 

“Son of a bitch,” Usopp muttered, pacing around to the side of it.

 

He grabbed his fruity drink from where he’d left it sitting on the top of the TV and took a short sip, thinking to himself. And then he kicked the television. Nothing. Then he kicked it considerably harder, and the TV, surprisingly, flickered to life, the telltale hissing whine of an old CRT TV ringing in their ears.

 

Usopp turned to them, taking a long victory drink, finishing it off, and he grinned triumphantly, a fist on his hip. “You all live with a fricking genius.”

 

Nami and Sanji clapped, dutifully impressed, and Zoro looked up from his thick textbook.

 

“Doesn’t look very fixed to me,” Zoro said, nodding towards the screen, which simply displayed the monochromatic crackly static of a television that wasn’t receiving any signal whatsoever.

 

Usopp looked over his shoulder, back at the television, and Sanji said for him in a flat voice, “Well, dumbass, we just don’t have a…”

 

Sanji trailed off because the three of them were probably realizing it all at the same time: they didn’t have a cable box, or anything to receive channels at all, or anything to play DVDs or anything similar, and come to think of it, probably none of them owned any movies at all anyway—Nami certainly didn’t.

 

Zoro looked at them like they were all idiots. Which was totally unwarranted.

 

“Well, whatever,” Sanji said, lighting another cigarette. He sucked air and smoke past his teeth and shrugged. “We’ll find something to watch somehow eventually.”

 

Zoro snorted and Sanji frowned at him for a brief second before relaxing his posture again.

 

“It’s not like you could’ve fixed that thing. You’re too stupid to do anything of value around here,” Sanji said lightly, matter-of-factly.

 

The door opened like it was on cue, and Luffy strode in, looking relatively sweaty and happy to be home. He started to greet everyone in his loud fashion that they’d all started getting very used to when he stopped, noticing the television.

 

“Hey yo—oh, woah, you guys got a TV! This is great!” Luffy walked over to it, and the thing was almost as tall as Luffy was himself—it had those giant built-in speakers on the bottom that made it two feet taller than it was already—and Nami smiled a little as Luffy looked like he’d just won a trip to Disney World. “I have so many DVDs we can watch!”

 

Nami turned her head to see Sanji raise his glass, his eyebrows, and the corners of his mouth to Zoro.

 

Zoro couldn’t roll his eyes any harder, and he said to Sanji, continuing their conversation from before Luffy had barged in, “Like you’re so capable. All you can do is cook, and not much to brag about.”

 

Sanji’s mouth actually dropped open a bit, he was so visibly insulted by Zoro’s remark.

 

Zoro grinned. “Did I hurt your feelings, Chef Boyardee?”

 

Usopp walked between them, physically ducking under their conversation as he went to the kitchen to refill his drink from the big pitcher of whatever delicious fruit-vodka-rum cocktail Sanji had made. Sanji and Zoro didn’t even see him.

 

“You’re literally too stupid to ever be of any actual value to society, despite your deepest efforts. Is there anything you’re good at? Because as far as I’ve seen, the only things you can do are drink a fifth of whiskey and pick your nose, and neither of those traits are particularly impressive,” Sanji said, acid lacing his speech.

 

Zoro opened his mouth to speak, but it was Luffy who said from across the room as he took a seat at the clunky dining table, “Fencing!”

 

The room turned to look at Luffy.

 

“What?” Sanji asked from the kitchen counter-bar.

 

“Fencing! Zoro’s a fencer! He fences. You know, swords? It’s so cool,” Luffy explained, sitting back in his seat.

 

All eyes fell on Zoro, who looked angrily down at his textbook.

 

“He has a scholarship!” Luffy added, and eyebrows were raised all around the room. “He’s super-good. You guys should see him. I didn’t know until I saw him in the gym up at Sabaody!”

 

“You fence?” Sanji asked Zoro, his voice cracking, and Zoro glared so hard at Sanji that Nami thought he might spontaneously burst into flames or something.

 

Zoro did not make eye contact with a single person in that room as he spoke in a low and almost dangerous voice.

 

“Yes.”

 

Usopp took a seat on the long couch next to Nami, and as he watched the impending explosion, he held his plastic cup up a bit, and Nami clinked her glass against it, and they each took a long drink.

 

Sanji absolutely lost it, covering his mouth as he laughed deep from his stomach, and Nami didn’t think she’d ever heard him laugh so hard, and probably Zoro hadn’t either, by the look on his face, and Sanji rubbed his eyes, grinning as he said to Zoro, “Your entire existence is like a hilarious joke.”

 

“You wanna talk about jokes?” Zoro spat, twisting around in the couch to address Sanji full-on. “A joke is some fuckwit with ridiculous blond wannabe-emo hair and a speech impediment who dances around the kitchen looking like Martha fucking Stewart, tripping over pretty girls who couldn’t take him seriously enough to tell him the time of the goddamn day.”

 

“Aw, he said I was pretty,” Nami whispered to Usopp, who snorted.

 

“Emo hair and what?” Sanji asked, pausing a little, a new cigarette halfway to his mouth.

 

“Speech impediment,” Zoro said, over-annunciating. “You know, that fucked up way you talk.”

 

“I…” Sanji began, slowly pointing at himself, “I don’t have a speech impediment?”

 

“Yes you do.”

 

“No, I fucking don’t.”

 

“Then what the hell is that?”

 

“It’s… Are you serious? My god, it’s an accent, you dumbfuck, you mother fucking _idiot_. English is my second fucking language.”

 

There was a quiet, “ _Ohhh_ ,” from the group, and Sanji gaped at all of them.

 

“You all… you all honestly thought I had a—“ Sanji began, almost stuttering.

 

“No, Sanji, not at all!” Nami said, trying her damn hardest not to smile, and Usopp wasn’t helping, he was fucking giggling into his cup, trying to hide his face. “It’s definitely totally obviously—“

 

“I always wondered what that was!” Luffy said, laughing. “So where are you from?”

 

Sanji turned his wide, icy blue eyes on Luffy, staring at him in clear and cold disbelief. “I’m… from France,” he said slowly, like he was talking to a very small and stupid child.

 

“ _Ohhh_ ,” the rest of the room said again, a little louder, and Sanji looked like he wanted to punch himself in the face. Nami wouldn’t put it past him. She could literally feel him fighting a difficult battle to keep from completely erupting.

 

Zoro chuckled. “So that’s why you talk like a dumbass.”

 

“Yeah, well you sound like a fucking neanderthal every time you open your ugly fucking mouth!” Sanji shouted at Zoro, lighting his cigarette and sucking hard on it.

 

Luffy was holding his face and laughing over at the dining table, doing absolutely nothing to calm the situation at all.

 

“At least people can understand what the hell I’m saying and I don’t sound like I have peanut butter stuck to the roof of my mouth every time I try to talk,” Zoro returned, folding his arms over the back cushion of the couch, egging Sanji on.

 

It was about then that the door to Chopper’s room swung open, and their youngest roommate walked into the hall and gave them all an agitated expression. “What the hell are you guys doing, I’m trying to study and you’re being so loud!“

 

“He scared the shit out of me, I always forget he’s here,” Usopp whispered to Nami, who smiled because honestly, she agreed.

 

But Chopper and Usopp were totally ignored as Sanji fired right back at Zoro, “Oh, like anyone’s gonna listen to someone who looks like they dipped their hair in fucking green Kool-Aid—you look like a fucking crusty punk, what kind of clown walks around looking like that at your age?”

 

Zoro grinned openly at Sanji. “Say the word ‘development’.”

 

“Oh fuck you,” Sanji hissed, and Nami could see his hands curling into tight fists.

 

Nami had never seen Zoro smile as openly as he was right then, right as he said to Sanji, “You’re obviously trying but it’s not there yet. Say the word ‘focus’.”

 

“You better focus on what the fuck you say next, because if it’s the wrong thing, I swear to god and heaven that I will—“

 

Zoro was trying not to laugh as he cut Sanji off and said, “Not ‘fuck-us’, idiot, it’s ‘focus’—“

 

“I’m going to ram my oxfords so far down your fucking throat that you’ll be shitting leather for weeks, you stupid goddamn idiot fucker,” Sanji growled, rising from his seat, and Chopper looked a little alarmed.

 

“Hey, guys—“ Chopper’s words fell on deaf ears.

 

“Gonna ram my oxfords so far down your throat—“ Zoro repeated, mocking Sanji’s speech patterns a bit.

 

“Oh, I’m going to fuck you up, you stupid shitty asshole,” Sanji said in a low voice as he stubbed his cigarette out in the ash tray, and Nami and Usopp leaned together a little.

 

“Maybe you should go stop them, Chopper looks like he might faint,” Nami whispered, and Usopp looked over at her, his drink in front of his mouth.

 

“Why do I have to be the one to do it? They’re about to literally kill each other, I don’t wanna fall victim as a civilian casualty in this,” Usopp said back to her under his breath.

 

“Because I’m really comfortable on this couch, Usopp,” Nami pouted at him, and Usopp looked back at Zoro and Sanji, who honestly did look like they were about to knock each other out. Zoro was rising from his seat and Sanji was stalking closer, looking like a junkyard dog about to attack an intruder.

 

Usopp and Nami glanced at Chopper, and he really did seem like he was about to have an anxiety attack. He wasn’t as used to these fights as the rest of them were, apparently.

 

“They won’t break your neck by accident in the crossfire,” Usopp said, and he had a good point.

 

“You’ll probably live,” Nami said, stirring her drink with her straw.

 

“Hell no.”

 

Luffy was still laughing, and Chopper really did look like he was about to panic and call the police or something, and just as Sanji looked like he was about to wreck Zoro’s shit or die trying, the front door flew open and a total stranger walked right into the living room.

 

“Luffy! Luffy, there you are!”

 

What in the flipping hell.

 

“I’m so sorry to impose on your privacy, I really am, I tried calling you several times and your phone didn’t seem to be turned on, but I had something very important to tell you, and I felt that this invasion would be justified!”

 

Luffy was the only one who did not seem utterly dumbstruck by the fact that an extremely tall, extremely old man had just busted into their home in a custom-tailored deep wine-colored velvet suit.

 

“Oh, hey!” Luffy started to say, but Zoro cut him off.

 

“Who the hell are you?” he asked, as was seemingly his normal way of greeting unexpected guests.

 

The old man threw his head back and laughed, really laughed, like it was almost a cackle, and Nami raised her eyebrow at Usopp, who matched her expression.

 

Luffy laughed with him, and the room was silent otherwise, waiting to be let in on the joke.

 

“Guys,” Luffy said, calming down a little, “this is Brook, he’s our landlord!”

 

“Oh,” Zoro said dumbly, and Sanji rolled his eyes.

 

“It’s nice to meet you, uh, sir,” Sanji filled in, a little slowly, and Zoro looked back at him like he was stupid. Sanji struggled to maintain a neutral face.

 

“Sorry about the, uh—“ Zoro began, but Brook laughed again.

 

“Not to worry, I did barge in and all! Technically, I just violated the lease! Oh, but I hope you’ll forgive me—you all have been very punctual with paying your deposits and first month’s rent, and you seem like very nice tenants,” Brook said, grinning at them all, and this old man literally had an actual afro.

 

He had just admitted to violating the lease. He might’ve been actually insane. Maybe just senile. But, whatever, the rent was outrageously affordable, so Nami planned on keeping her mouth shut.

 

Nami had thought it weird at first when Luffy had been the one to hand her the lease contract, but he’d assured her that their landlord was really nice, and he lived next door, and he could just walk it over after she’d signed and... Well. Maybe he’d done that to avoid her having second thoughts upon finding out her landlord was fucking bonkers. 

 

“You had something important to tell me?” Luffy asked, and Brook suddenly remembered himself, sitting down at the table next to Luffy.

 

“I did! You’ll be happy to hear that I was lingering around the women’s studies quad,” Brook began, and Nami and Usopp exchanged a quick what-in-the-hell look, “and I came to understand that the culinary students are doing an event where free food is being given away, and—“

 

“Oh shit,” Luffy said, immediately serious and very interested. “We need to get down there right now. Can you drive? Or, Usopp, can you? We should hurry—we should leave right this second.”

 

Nami and Usopp both sat and watched while Luffy scrambled to gather up everything he thought he’d need before Usopp even bothered agreeing to drive him. They both turned their gaze on their landlord, who was grinning with a huge mouth, and he was so old and tall and thin that Nami couldn’t imagine him eating anything at all, even free culinary student food.

 

“He’s slightly creepy. But endearing, almost?” Nami whispered very quietly into Usopp’s ear, and he turned to her and gave her a look. 

 

“He looks like Jack fucking Skellington with an afro.” 

 

Nami snorted and shushed him, and they watched as Luffy more or less commanded everyone to join them, and after a couple minutes of arguing—mostly from Chopper, who was convinced he already had a mountain of work to complete this early in the school year—they were all standing and stretching and getting ready to pile into Usopp’s old car. 

 

Nami had zero interest in going to a culinary student thing. She wasn’t even hungry. And yet, there she was, sitting in the front seat of the station wagon, listening idly as her roommates and her _landlord_ chattered away, crammed into the back seats behind her and Usopp. 

 

She felt a theme building. 

 

 

* * *

 

 

Zoro groggily pulled himself upright, sluggishly swinging his feet over the side of the bed.He fumbled with the phone lying on the bedside table, checking the time.A quarter past nine.He had only been asleep a couple of hours.

 

He contemplated just rolling back into bed and sleeping a little longer.One or ten more hours.  

 

But then, that bundle of nerves in the pit of his stomach that made him feel like he'd swallowed a rock started to bother him.He was behind.He wasn't even a month into the semester and he was feeling utterly... well, lost.  

 

Yawning a bit too hard, he rolled himself to his feet, looking at the beat-up old desk with disdain.It had so much stuff on it, he couldn't even see the surface.Text books, study guides, supplements, notes. But even with all of the so-called “cheat sheets” for business concepts and terminology, it didn't help a damn bit.

 

An hour passed.He'd read half the chapter and highlighted a bunch of shit. Anything he didn't really understand, so he could go back and look at it again later.

 

There were a lot of highlights.

 

Shit.He couldn't take it anymore.His legs—no, his entire body was feeling restless.Maybe he'd go running or something.Then he'd come back to it and make a little more progress.

 

More... Had he even made any yet?

 

He pulled on the same clothes he'd thrown on the floor at the foot of the bed when he'd went to sleep.Black sweatpants, white socks—slightly gray on the bottom—and a dark green hoodie.They were dirty, just like the white t-shirt he'd slept in, but whatever, he'd change after he showered.

 

His quick run accidentally turned into more than an hour—not his intention, but the roads around the neighborhood were so damn confusing.They twisted and turned, curved into dead ends, and none of the back roads seemed to connect to a recognizable street.After a while, though, he found himself on campus, and then he was mostly able to make his way back to the house.Well, with maybe one or two wrong turns, but he got there.

 

A shower and a quick meal later, and he was feeling a lot better.He didn't feel like staying in his room, though.Grabbing his Economic Statistics textbook and notes, he went down into the living room to get through a chapter.

 

A half hour later, the anxiety was slowly creeping back up on him.This was so tedious and slow.But if he kept working at it, he'd show progress.Just like if he kept running, he'd go a little further every day.If he kept lifting weights, he'd be able to pick up a little more each time.Studying was just like that—he just had to work harder.

 

Footsteps came down the stairs, accompanied by the smell of smoke.Shit, he was in no mood.

 

He tried to ignore him, but suddenly the pungent scent was right behind him.His jaw slowly started to clench.

 

“What, seriously?” Sanji asked, leaning over the back of the couch, his head hovering somewhere above Zoro's shoulder.“That's like a sophomore class.What the hell are you doing taking that now?”

 

“I switched majors.”That idiot knew that.He'd told him before.

 

“Yeah, but still... You're in two, right?”

 

“Two what?”The _hell_ was he talking about?

 

“Uh, like you took Econ Stat before, and now you're taking Econ Stat II?”

 

“Oh.Yeah.”What a stupid way to abbreviate a class name.

 

“Well, that's something at least.”Sanji exhaled, an obnoxious stream of smoke wafting in Zoro's direction.“Man, it's going to be awhile before you graduate.”

 

“Yep,” Zoro replied shortly.Real helpful comments.Like he didn't already know that.Asshole.He kept his eyes focused on the text, hoping his annoying roommate would get the hint.  

 

Then Sanji disappeared for awhile and Zoro was thankful for it.He tried to reread the page he had been on while that jackass was hovering over him.Nope.It still didn't make a lot of sense.  

 

_The mathematical deﬁnition of probability function is based on three axioms, which are based on our intuitive notion of probability._

 

Yeah, he had literally no idea what that meant.Oh well.He highlighted a few terms and problems he didn't really get—why were there math equations in a business course, anyway?—and skipped to the next page.He'd try again later.Maybe it'd make more sense after the class happened.

 

But the next day in class, even after hearing the lecture, he still didn't really get it.What was the purpose of all this, anyway?

 

The next class wasn't any better—and to make it even worse, by some terrible misfortune, this class was with Sanji.

 

The class was Business Ethics, and the teacher—Professor Califa—was short-tempered and severe.In addition to having a rigorous course schedule and an impossible number of tests and papers sprinkled into the semester, she was kind of intense about her job. 

 

Like even though most professors pretty much ignored students that showed up late or fucked around on their phone, she'd single them out and interrogate them in front of the whole class.And if, god forbid, someone fell asleep, she'd walk by the student's table and slap her hand down on it as loudly as possible, not even breaking the pace of her lecture.Some poor guy had fallen right out of his chair when she did that during the third or fourth class; Zoro was just glad it wasn't him.

 

“This isn't high school and you don't get a grade for attendance,” she'd explained sharply on the first day of class.“If you want to go home and sleep, then do it.”  

 

Zoro's table had been slammed on more than once or twice.

 

Today, he was crinkling his brow, staring up at the PowerPoint presentation glowing on the screen that covered a good section of the front wall.He was furiously scribbling everything down—maybe it was already in the text, he couldn't quite remember, but he better make sure he got it all, just in case.All the concepts seemed like they were probably the same thing.Why the hell were the names so similar? 

 

He wrote a note about the Securities Act of 1933, about how it regulated offers and sales of securities.Something about the Great Depression.Was that in 1933?He wasn't really sure.But when he looked up again, it said 1934.What?He was pretty sure it'd said 1933 a second ago.Was this a new slide?

 

It sounded exactly the same.He raised his hand.

 

“Yes?” 

 

“Uh, is that—is that the same thing?”

 

Professor Califa frowned deeply as she slipped her glasses further up her nose.“No, they're two different acts.That's why they're on two slides.”

 

“Uh, I mean,” Zoro said, trying to string together a more intelligible question.He wasn't good at explaining himself.“I mean, the names are similar, and they sort of sound like they're the same.They, uh, they're both about selling securities, right?” 

 

He almost said _stock._ But were securities stocks?He opened his mouth to start to ask, but he got the feeling that he should've known that.

 

Califa paused for a moment.Zoro hated it when professors paused like that—like they were struggling to dumb something down.  

 

His eyes flitted away from the teacher for a moment, and he saw the three students in the first row glaring back at him.  

 

Well, one of them was Sanji—he didn't count.

 

“To put it on the most basic terms, the 1933 Act regulated offers and sales of securities, but it was the Securities Exchange Act—the 1934 Act—that dealt with really enforcing it.”Although Califa was a little curt, she spoke slowly, carefully studying Zoro as she explained.“Specifically, it established the SEC.”

 

Those were the most basic terms?Shit.

 

“The SEC?” Zoro replied.He wasn't sure what that was.

 

An exasperated whisper from someone sitting near the back of the class.He tried to ignore it.Who cares, anyway, he needed to get this, too.

 

“The Securities Exchange Commission.You've probably talked about it more extensively in your other classes.”She stared at him a moment.Seeing no spark of recognition, she elaborated.“The SEC is the agency that enforces securities laws and regulates exchange of securities.”

 

“Alright...” Zoro replied.She might as well have been speaking a foreign language for how much that explained.

 

“Let's put it this way.It's against the law to steal, right?But if there was no one to enforce that law, even if some people wouldn't steal, just knowing that law was there, a lot of people would if they knew there was no way they'd be punished even if they were caught.Right?”

 

“I guess so.”

 

“That's why we have law enforcement—the police can arrest somebody if they steal.So it's like the 1933 Act laid down the rule—it's the law that needs to be followed. But wasn't really enforced until the SEC—the 'policing' part of it—came into existence.”

 

“So the 1934 Act is... the police,” Zoro said carefully.

 

“Precisely.”

 

Okay.That made sense.A lot of sense, actually.Maybe he had this.He scribbled down Califa's surprisingly simple analogy so he wouldn't forget it later.

 

Unfortunately, while writing, he realized she'd moved onto the next concept, and it seemed totally unrelated.Dammit.  

 

And so, he had to raise his hand again, and ask another question that he could tell at least a few people were annoyed with, from the murmurs and huffs behind him.

 

Once again, his obnoxious roommate was glaring back at him.What a stupid, awful coincidence that they had not one, but _two_ classes together this semester.It was bad enough that they were always crossing paths at home, but to have to keep seeing each other on campus, too...

 

Well, still, thanks to him he had a place to sleep in he could actually afford and didn't need to mooch off of his friends Johnny and Yosaku any longer.It'd just be easier if he and Sanji maybe didn't have to see each other all the time.

 

Even the way he sat at the table was kind of irritating.Sanji had his seat pushed back, angling his body away so he could rest an ankle on top of his knee, in a relaxed cross-legged manner, his left hand loosely placed on the thigh of his dockers.Casual.  

 

Professor Califa was talking about securities fraud now.  

 

“We've probably all heard of insider trading—”

 

Uh, we have?

 

“—But there are actually a number of things can can be classified as securities fraud.”

 

He wasn't really sure what insider trading was, but he'd heard of ponzi schemes before—pyramid schemes.He could image the triangle-shaped picture from the text book. 

 

“Can anyone give me a couple of examples?”

 

A guy a few seats down from Zoro raised his hand and smugly called out, “Charles Ponzi!” 

 

Smartass.Like ponzi was a person or something.Yeah, and maybe John and Jeff Ponzi, too.

 

Califa narrowed her eyes.“Right. But naming off the person who's the namesake isn't exactly clever.”

 

There really was a Charles Ponzi?He was an actual person?

 

She pointed at another student.

 

“Bernie Madoff,” the young woman called out.

 

“Good.That's one of the biggest ones.Yes?” She nodded at another student with his hand raised.  

 

“I think that N'Sync guy... The manager or whatever.I can't remember his name, though.”

 

“You're right.Lou Pearlman is his name.You?”Califa pointed at Sanji, who was nonchalantly raising his hand upward, elbow still rested on the table.

 

“Dancepowder Investments.”

 

She raised her eyebrows in surprise.“Well, looks like you actually pay attention to the local news—that one hits pretty close to home, doesn't it.”  

 

“Yeah.From what I've read, it seems like most of the victims are retirees from around here.”

 

What, did that guy actually read the news?  

 

Califa's eyes drifted over the rest of the class before she returned her gaze back to Sanji.“From the lost looks right now, I'm guessing most of the class isn't too familiar with it.Think you can explain it?”

 

“Sure,” Sani replied.And then, he launched into this ridiculously detailed explanation, citing a bunch of the damn terms Zoro had just written down in his notebook that he didn't even understand.But here was Sanji, using them like it was his fucking hobby.

 

Zoro pressed his lips in a slight frown.The bastard didn't even seem nervous about it, either—he sure as hell didn't bother sitting up even the slightest bit from his ultra-relaxed pose. Casual as hell. 

 

When he finally ended his explanation, Califa stared at him for a moment, a faint smile playing at the corner of her thin lips.“Well put.I couldn't have said it better myself.And you were able to tie it into what we talked about today—glad to see you're paying attention.”

 

“How could I not?” Sanji replied with practiced flattery.  

 

Jesus Christ.

 

It only got worse as the class continued.Sanji was called on a few more times—and even though Zoro could barely even grasp the concepts, that bastard apparently understood it well enough to comment on any subject thrown at him. 

 

Zoro pressed both hands to his head, fingers splayed, as he listened to them banter back and forth.

 

When was this damn class going to end?He couldn't take it another minute.Being there wasn't helping.It didn't matter.

 

When Professor Califa concluded the lecture, Zoro was the first person out the door.

 

When Zoro got home, he grabbed two beers from the fridge and retreated up to his room.It was only early afternoon, but whatever.He still had a lot of work to do, and he needed something to calm the steadily increasing pressure taking shelter somewhere within his ribcage.He hated this feeling, hated not making progress, hated that no matter what he tried academically, he felt like he was trying to swim up a river with his legs tied together.

 

He was actually good at a lot of things.Why the fuck couldn't he do this?

 

A few hours passed and he was feeling restless.He'd gone down to the kitchen once in between, and now there were three empty beer cans in the little trash can next to his desk—about to be four.He chugged the last few sips, throwing it into the trash with finality.He should get more.

 

He opened his door to Luffy and Usopp's backs.Luffy was banging on Sanji's door—which was right across from his—and Usopp held his cell phone in front of him.Zoro could see the text message screen pulled up.  

 

“Oh, Zoro!” Luffy spun around, as Sanji's door swung open.  

 

“What's up?” Sanji asked, gaze falling on Luffy.He glanced up and caught Zoro's eye for a second.

 

Luffy looked back and forth between them, that grin of his spreading across his face..“You guys wanna go to a party?” 

 

“What, you mean now?” Sanji asked, his eyebrows raising slightly.

 

“Yeah! My friend's having a party.”

 

“On a Thursday?”

 

“He's in a frat.”

 

“Oh,” Sanji said; apparently that was a perfectly acceptable reason to have a party on a weeknight.

 

“Come on, it'll be fun.”He slung his arm around Sanji's shoulder, yanking him out of his room. “Zoro, you'll come too, right?”

 

“Uh...”

 

“Come on, you have to,” Luffy insisted as Sanji stumbled and struggled to right himself under Luffy's friendship-headlock.

 

“Do I?”

 

“Yeah, come on, everybody's going.”

 

“Is that so.”

 

Usopp nodded, tucking his phone back into his pocket.“Yeah, Nami's at work, but her shift's about to end so I'm going to pick her up on the way.”

 

Sanji finally managed to shove Luffy away from him, and he pushed his hair back and stood up straight, all in one quick jerky movement. He took a deep breath. 

 

"Yeah, sure, why not," he agreed.

 

He had a class early on Fridays—Zoro knew from living with him only a short while—but he wasn't really surprised that Sanji would opt to go along

 

“Alright, let's go then.Come on, Zoro.”

 

“I didn't say I was going to,” Zoro mentioned, looking back over his shoulder at his empty room.“I need to... Uh, I should probably study more.”

 

Luffy's face fell.“Aw, come on, it wouldn't be the same without you, Zoro.”

 

Zoro bit his lip, eyes fixed on his messy desk.He'd been trying to study all night.Would a few hours make a difference?

 

“I should probably study too, but it's just a couple hours,” Usopp added.“We've all got to take a break sometimes.”

 

“Yeah, it's just a _couple hours_ ,” Luffy echoed.

 

“Even Usopp understands you have to actually live at some point,” Sanji said, ignoring Usopp's narrowed eyes. He turned towards Zoro, bunching his shoulders up in an obvious shrug.“You might as well just go.” 

 

Zoro rubbed his eyes, shaking his head slightly.But he caved.“Okay, yeah, whatever.”

 

“Awesome,” Luffy smiled.“Alright. Let's go tell Chopper and then we can go!”

 

“I thought you said everyone was going,” Zoro said.

 

“Yeah, I did?” Luffy looked back at him, tilting his head slightly.“I mean. Chopper _is_ going.”

 

Usopp was already halfway down the stairs when he called back up to them,“Luffy just hasn't told him yet!”

 

 

Luffy followed Usopp down the stairs, and Zoro turned back toward Sanji, who was already watching him as he took a thoughtful drag off of his cigarette.“Hurry up and put on your party clothes," he said, as pompous and jeering as he could be.

 

He slipped back into his room and slammed the door—probably to put on his own party clothes, or whatever, knowing that dumbass.  

 

What a fucking idiot.

 

Zoro realized he was clenching his teeth.Forcing himself to take a deep breath, he headed downstairs.He'd grab another beer while he waited.

 

Getting Chopper to come along might have bordered on kidnapping.But ultimately, he came, and the five of them piled into Usopp's station wagon.  

 

Once they picked up Nami, they headed over to this shitty little frat house on the outskirts of campus—the opposite side of their house—and the second they walked in the front door, Zoro really wished they'd done something else.

 

The music was loud and terrible.It boomed excessively, and the bass made his chest jump in an uncomfortable rhythm, even before he walked in the wide-open front door.There were some kind of letters on the front of the house, some kind of Alpha Omega Beta Gamma Stardust Megatron, he didn't know what the fuck they meant and he didn't really care.  

 

If there was one thing he knew about the Greek frats on campus, though, it was that if someone had an in, there was usually a lot of free flowing booze.And Luffy barely made it inside before he greeted three different people.  

 

Apparently Luffy knew half of the entire Sabaody student body.

 

Although for this party, Zoro was pretty sure he wouldn't have been stopped even if he had gone in on his own—most of the people hanging out in the entryway were already too hammered to care.  

 

The entryway opened into a living room and kitchen, where the music pumped even louder.It was more crowded than he would've liked.It's not that he didn't do well in crowds, he just, well, disliked them.Especially ones like this, where with each step, someone else annoyed him.Wow, there were a lot.A lot of fucking people.

 

Guy in a t-shirt with a tie.Two girls practically tripping onto each other, screaming about how drunk they were. Dude in a fedora hat.A high five christened with a loud shout of "Bro!" in front of his face.Some guy yelling about brewskies.A girl with running make-up, dancing with her top off.Some kid double-fisting beers.Some other kid talking about crushing pussy.

 

Zoro kind of hated frats.

 

But after he maneuvered his way through the living room, he found himself in the kitchen, and that was the destination he really needed to reach.

 

There was an island in the center of the kitchen covered in so many bottles of beer and liquor, he couldn't even tell what color the counter top was.It'd make the music and throngs of people a little easier to tolerate, anyway.  

 

“Here,” Luffy said, handing him a red solo cup full of something—it was dark and smelled like rum—and Zoro look a long swallow without asking what it was.He wasn't exactly sure how Luffy'd made it to the kitchen first, but it seemed like he was familiar with the house.

 

When Nami, Usopp, and Chopper finally squeezed their way into the kitchen, Chopper already looked like he was at his limit.

 

“I don't understand, is this what parties are like?” he asked shrilly, his wild eyes darting in seemingly every direction at once.“It's so loud and everybody's already so drunk.”

 

“Well. Yes and no?” Usopp told him, reaching over him to grab a bottle of clear liquor.

 

A pair of something turquoise-colored and lacy whizzed through the air, stopping when it bounced and landed harmlessly on Chopper's shoulder.

 

"Some parties are better than others," Usopp said, picking the foreign object off Chopper's shoulder, hooking it around his index finger and holding it out to the younger man. 

 

Chopper's eyes did that thing where they got all huge, and he stumbled back a step, nearly knocking Nami over. 

 

Usopp laughed and dropped what was clearly a pair of girl's underwear on the floor, stepping around them as he poured himself a glass of what had to be vodka. 

 

Chopper looked like he was about to keel over.

 

“Come on, let's get a drink,” Nami told Chopper, smiling gently as she pressed a hand on his shoulder, urging him forward.

 

“What?Are you crazy?” he shouted, his eyes looking like they just might bug out of his head.“I can't drink!”

 

But between Nami and Luffy, they rapidly managed to coax a clear plastic cup filled to the brim into Chopper's hands.He never really stood a chance in the first place.Luffy alone was pretty convincing, but Nami could probably convince Chopper into a whole lot more than weeknight drinking, if she really set her mind to it.  

 

She was pretty impressive. And slightly scary. Well, no not sca... Okay, she was scary. Fine.

 

Chopper'd only had what was probably a few sips, but he was already pink-cheeked and grinning like a dip.If only it was still that easy.

 

The music was getting increasingly worse.It was remixed and spun and dropped... What was this shit called? Dubstep?Whatever, he didn't care, it was loud and kind of dumb.It kind of sounded like cars fucking. People were drunkenly dancing to it, rubbing against each other, rubbing against him as he tried to walk past them.

 

Sanji was in the corner, cigarette between two fingers that were wrapped around the neck of a bottle of beer, and he was chatting up a couple of pretty women.The expression on his face was really annoying, like he thought he was smoother than he actually was.

 

Well, really, there was no question about that.

 

“Hey, dick, you can't smoke in here,” a guy said to him.

 

“Huh, that's news to me.I just walked past five other people smoking right in your living room.”

 

“They're not smoking _cigarettes_ though, asshole.”

 

“Oh. I'm really sorry,” Sanji said, tilting his head and kneading his eyebrows together a bit like he was genuinely concerned, and he exhaled a fat stream of thick smoke that wafted all around the frat guy's face.

 

Zoro rolled his eyes and honestly didn't care if Sanji got jacked straight in the face. Which wouldn't surprise Zoro, if it happened. He deserved it.What a dumb argument.Sanji really was an asshole.

 

So he wandered around.Drank.Wandered some more. It didn't take him long to lose track of Luffy. But that didn't really matter.

 

Although he wasn't much of a party-goer, he had to admit... This one was _terrible_.

 

And he needed another drink.

 

Zoro scanned the room.Luffy was chatting with a guy near the door, and Sanji was still in the corner, talking to several different girls than the ones he'd been chatting up earlier.And yep, that was it, he didn't know anyone else here and there were too many overtly obnoxious people for him to really care to make any new acquaintances.

 

After a few wrong turns, he found his way back to the kitchen—which also happened to be near where where Usopp, Nami and a red-faced Chopper were sitting, talking and chuckling to each other, far away from everyone else.Seemed like a good place to be.After making himself another drink, he joined them.

 

He gulped down his drink quickly, not really paying attention to any one person in particular, although there was a woman with long, blue hair swept back into a ponytail standing right in his line of sight, so his eyes sort of automatically kept falling back to her—particularly when a frat guy approached her, talking just loudly enough for him to hear every dumb word.

 

"Hey, I'm so sorry to bother you, but I had to tell you, okay, you look incredible,” he started.

 

Her eyes widened slightly in surprise.“Oh, um, wow, thank you—"

 

"Like, I'm kind of blown away by you right now," he went on, cutting her off.

 

"Uh, yeah, thank you,” she repeated, shifting on her feet uncomfortably.“That's so nice of you to say...” 

 

“Are you drinking anything?Can I get you a drink?”

 

“Oh that's okay, I still have this...” she said, raising a bottle of some kind of sugary sweet malt liquor that only had a sip or two left in it.

 

“What, that's almost gone!” he said.“Come on, I'll get you something else.”

 

God, this fucking guy.People like this were so irritating.Zoro clenched his teeth a bit as he turned his head, forcing himself to tune the frat dipshit out.  

 

Zoro cleared his throat and Usopp glanced at him.

 

"Hey, how long do you wanna stay here?" he asked, standing up and glancing around the party. 

 

"I'm ready whenever you guys are," Zoro replied.

 

"Yeah, this is pretty awful," Nami agreed, pushing back her chair and standing with him. Zoro stood as well, and Chopper stayed where he sat, clutching an empty plastic cup, his head dipped a little and his elbows on his knees.

 

Zoro scowled in Sanji's direction.“But good luck convincing Pepé Le Pew over there it's time to go,” he muttered, sort of imagining he was saying the same things the dumbass standing with the blue-haired girl had just spouted off.He sort've seemed like that type of guy.  

 

“Well, I _am_ the one with the car, so I have a little bit of power in this,” Usopp said, holding up a single finger.And then he held up another, like he was counting.“But Luffy was the one who invited us all, so I don't want to rush him out too fast.Uh, I think he said this was his friend's party, right?”

 

Zoro nodded in agreement.

 

“I'm never coming to another party again,” Chopper groaned sullenly, fingers curled around his cup a little too tightly.Zoro glanced at him and smiled slightly.Was he already slurring, just from one drink?

 

“It's not always like this,” Usopp assured Chopper, patting him on the back, which Chopper didn't seem to appreciate very much.

 

“Vivi, huh?What a pretty name.Fits you perfectly,” the man in the kitchen said, loudly enough to force Zoro to pay attention to the conversation again.Great.

 

“Thank you,” came her automatic, apprehensive reply.

 

"So, Vivi, some friends of mine and I are over in the other room, you should come hang out with us for a bit.” 

 

"Oh, I'm waiting for a couple friends here—" 

 

"The house isn't that big, they'll find you just fine!"

 

"Really, that's okay, I'm just going to—"

 

He leaned in closer to her, slipping an arm around her shoulders. "Oh my god, you worry too much! Are you always such a worrier? C'mon, enjoy yourself for, like, ten minutes here." 

 

Vivi tried to twist away, but he firmly rested his hand on her shoulder, holding her in place as he started to walk forward.Unable to break free, she took a few reluctant steps along with him.

 

"It's not that, I just—"

 

"Calm down, I'm a nice guy!"

 

"Who the fuck are you?" 

 

And suddenly, Nami was there.

 

“Why are you fucking touching my friend right now?” 

 

Nami spoke loudly, and like she owned that entire house. She had complete authority immediately. Which was weird, seeing someone that small suddenly become that large. She had already, somehow, wedged herself between Vivi and this douchebag. 

 

“Who the fuck are—“ he started to say, but before he could finish the question, Nami, fucking somehow, removed Vivi from his grip and glared goddamn daggers at the frat guy. 

 

“It doesn’t matter who I am! What matters right now is that you were touching my fucking _friend_ , and you are being a pain in her ass, and you need to get away from us right now.” She jammed an index finger into his sternum. 

 

“You are being fucking insane right now, alright—“ 

 

“You haven’t seen insane, prick,” Nami said, and her voice was low, and she leaned into her finger and he actually took a step backwards, holding up his arms a bit. Like she was holding a gun to him. 

 

“I was literally just talking to her.” 

 

Out of the corner of his eye, Zoro saw a flash of blond.Surprisingly enough, it was Sanji, who had somehow managed to pry himself away from the corner full of sorority girls.Um. What?

 

While Nami continued telling the douchey frat guy exactly what the fuck he was doing and exactly why he was an asshole, Sanji stepped over to Vivi, bending over at the waist as he whispered something to her.

 

The frat guy who had been hitting on her didn’t even notice.

 

As they walked past Usopp and Chopper, Sanji gave Usopp a nod, which Usopp apparently understood.  

 

“Come on, Chopper," Usopp said, jostling Chopper's shoulder. "Let's head out to the car.”

 

"Okay," Chopper said weakly.

 

Zoro nearly got up to follow them, but instead, he leaned back in his seat and watched Nami.This was kind of interesting.She was pretty intense—he sure as hell never wanted to be on the receiving end of one of her ass-chewings.

 

“Look, I don't know what—“

 

“I don't even know why you're still talking!” Nami interjected.“Why are you still here?”

 

“The fuck is your problem!” he cried out, his hands up in the air, glancing back over his shoulder like somebody was going to give him some support, but no one was there.  

 

Including Vivi.

 

He did a double-take at the empty space behind him when he saw she was absent.

 

“Look, there is literally _no_ reason for you to be standing here anymore.So okay.Bye.You need to leave,” she said, waving a hand at him sarcastically.

 

“You know what?Fuck you, bitch,” he said to Nami, his face twisting into an ugly scowl as he threw up a middle finger and walked away.

 

Nami turned to Zoro.He fully expected her to be in some kind of crazed rage, but to his surprise, she just grinned at him—calm and triumphant.

 

He couldn't help but chuckle a little.“Geez.Did you really know that girl?”

 

“Nah,” she said, shaking her head.“But guys need to not fuck around. If a girl says no, she means no and that's that, there's no fucking alternative.”

 

“You're kind of scary.”

 

She smiled at Zoro and shrugged her shoulders, all innocence that absolutely wasn't real. “Good, make sure you remember that.Now come on, let's get outta here.”She grabbed him by the sleeve of his t-shirt, pulling him along.

 

He reunited with everyone out front, noticing that they'd managed to grab Luffy on their way out. 

 

As soon as Vivi saw Nami, she grinned and made an immediate approach. She laughed a little, putting her hands on her hips. "Oh my god, thank—“ 

 

"No problem. You're Vivi, right? I'm Nami."She returned her broad smile, crossing her arms over her chest. 

 

"Nami," Vivi said, her long ponytail falling over her shoulder as she leaned forward a bit, "you are awesome."

 

Zoro glanced over at Sanji, who was leaning casually against the porch railing, a cigarette perched on the edge of his lip.He'd expected him to be all over Vivi, now that he'd sort of rescued her and all, but instead he was leisurely chatting to Chopper about who-knows-what.

 

Huh.Just, huh.

 

“You’re way too nice. Has anyone ever told you that?” Nami was saying to Vivi.  

 

Vivi curled her lips inwards as she smiled.“Well. Alright. You’re not necessarily the first person to say that to me.”

 

“I bet not,” Nami laughed.“But seriously, you can't let douchebags like that walk all over you. You can’t always be nice to everyone!”

 

“You’re right, you’re right, I need to stop being so… nice. I guess?”  

 

“Yes,” Nami said, smiling. “You do.” 

 

“I’m sorry if this is forward and I’m a little drunk, but I’m glad I met you,” Vivi said, and they both laughed. 

 

They wound up hanging out with Vivi for a couple of hours at the house after that, and Luffy said he had some alien documentaries, so he put one of those on, and they stayed up drinking and watching crappy television until late.

 

Way too late.

 

If Usopp hadn't banged on his door the next morning, waking him up and offering to give him a ride to his class, Zoro would've never made it in time.Maybe it would have been just as well if he hadn't, though.He was so tired, his ability to follow along with the Econ Stat lecture was even shittier than usual. 

 

What a stupid fucking way to abbreviate a class name.And he couldn't stop doing it now.

 

When he was done with classes for the day, he retreated to his room, staring at the nonsensical notes he'd tried to take during class.A lot of the words faded into jagged curves and sharp lines disappearing at the edge of the page; he'd nodded off more than few times.

 

Fuck.These were useless.And so was the damn book.  

 

There was a knock at his door.

 

“What?” he yelled sharply, not having a good place to aim his frustrations.

 

The door swung open abruptly—almost sounded like it was kicked open—and Zoro turned around to glare at whoever was interrupting him

 

Suddenly, a notebook was launched right at his face; it would've hit him smack dab in the center of his forehead if his quick reflexes hadn't kicked in.Zoro blocked it with his arm and it tumbled harmlessly to the floor.  

 

“There ya go, asshole,” Sanji called out, leaning into the doorway, one forearm resting on the frame.How could someone have such obnoxious posture.

 

“What the fuck is your problem?” Zoro snapped, his brow twisting into a deep scowl.

 

“What?” Sanji said jeeringly, an obnoxious smirk twisted across his features.“I'm helping you, you ungrateful prick.”

 

“What are you talking about?”

 

“My Econ Stat notes.”

 

That fucking abbreviation _again_.

 

Zoro stared dumbly at the notebook on the floor.Begrudgingly, he picked it up and opened it to the first page, squinting as he read.“Wow, this is...” 

 

“Helpful, right?”

 

“No... I was going to say terrible.”Zoro looked up at him, deadpanning.“Your handwriting looks like shit.”

 

“Fuck you,” Sanji replied reflexively, but his tone was actually pretty relaxed. Almost teasing, maybe.

 

Zoro's eyes drifted back to the notebook—yeah, the handwriting was bad, but they were organized and clear.Was it actually possible for people to just take notes so easy to follow, right in the middle of a class like that?

 

Feeling eyes still on him, he looked back up at Sanji.He was staring at him, the corner of his lip obnoxiously upturned as he arrogantly puffed away on his cigarette.

 

“You look like an idiot right now,” Zoro told him, narrowing his eyes.  

 

Turning around and flippantly waving a hand in the air, as if to say whatever, Sanji slammed his door closed.  

 

He really did look like an idiot. Total asshole.But. Okay, Zoro had to admit—no, he wouldn't admit it. Nope. Fuck that.

 

Goddamn it.

 

Maybe there was a shred of something not totally loathsome that occasionally peeked out.

 

Zoro bit down on the end of his pen, his brows knitted together as he stared at the spidery scrawl in Sanji's notebook, not really taking in any of the words.He didn't have time to worry about his insufferable roommate or his stupidly haughty attitude.Because it didn't matter.He didn't matter.

 

What mattered was that Zoro really _did_ have to understand this shit.This was a core class and he had to pass it to graduate.And he couldn't just _barely_ pass, he had to do more than that, because—shit, because C's and D's weren't going to be enough this time.

 

He couldn't waste any time fucking around.

 

Abruptly, he pushed his chair away from the desk, opening up the bottom door of the rickety desk, which was where he'd tossed all of his supposedly important papers when he'd gotten there last month.Before that, they'd been in an old shoebox, so a drawer seemed as good a place as any to keep them.

 

Organization wasn't really his thing, though, so they were all mixed up.In fact, maybe some of them weren't that important.A random selection of papers were shuffled together, like cell phone bills and bank statements, his high school diploma, birth certificate, the warranty replacement for a laptop he didn't even have anymore, old random school papers he thought he might need to reference again, and—then he found what he was looking for.The letter he'd gotten from the school, right before his old apartment had become uninhabitable.

 

A warning letter about his low GPA.

 

Zoro reread it for what was probably the thirtieth or fortieth time before he shoved it back into the drawer.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> omg you are over 30k words into this fic and you’re still here and you are so wonderful, dear reader
> 
> we wanna say, most of all, thank you so much for all the reviews and follows and kudos and reblogs and etc etc man like we rEAD YOUR TAGS AND COMMENTS, WE READ ALL THE THINGS, AND LITERALLY i mean okay personally i spent most of that day we first posted sitting on my bed hugging myself and grinning like a huge dipdip. raquel maybe cried. basically we want you to understand our overwhelming gratitude for your support thus far, and we hope you like what you’ve read up to this point. 
> 
> also huge special thank you to those that’ve drawn fanart already wOWZERS for real wow dream come true and i’m not exaggerating. we will have a permanent link to all the fanart on that little mnm portal page on tumblr, which you can find a link to on all mnm chapter tumblr posts and also on my blog and raquel’s. 
> 
> alright. that’s enough talking okay okay. hopefully we’ll see you in chapter 3: october ~*~*~


	3. October

Sanji strolled along the bustling campus, a cigarette hanging from his mouth like he'd been born with it there, and he wondered why he'd gotten there so damn early.

 

Okay, he really had had a reason—he'd gotten up early to spend an hour or so in the library because he had a paper due in his Managerial Economics course in about, oh, three days or so, and it was probably time for him to get started on the research, i.e., go look up a couple of relevant articles to cite as sources and bullshit the rest.  

 

But as it turned out, all of articles he needed were actually online, so with the help of a pretty girl in a pony tail and glasses—because the student portal was pretty confusing, and he just wanted to print off some fucking article's for god's sake, and for some reason whenever he clicked on anything, it didn't do what he wanted it to do—he'd acquired everything he needed to fudge together a research paper.And by that point, he'd been more concerned with getting her to come get come coffee with him—but sadly, she declined, said she had too much work to do.

 

Oh well.At least he had the articles he needed.He'd read them tonight.Probably.Didn't feel like it right now.

 

He walked the length of the campus, chain-smoking and admiring the, uh, scenery. 

 

There were so many pretty girls at this school.And, alright, he knew he was a shallow asshole, like that wasn’t news to him.But he couldn’t help it.A woman’s body was a beautiful thing, and he had this problem of falling in love with beautiful things so easily. 

 

But maybe it wasn’t love. Or maybe it was? Because when it happened, when he did sleep with someone, he loved them so hard, with all his might, but he never felt the same in the morning. He felt like he was still looking for something. Like he was grasping at straws. And it was never long before he fell in love all over again.

 

Then a terrible sight ripped him away from his mostly pleasant thoughts.Well, pleasant in comparison, anyway.  

 

Sanji'd never understood why gyms tended to have giant windows instead of walls.Maybe sporty people got some kind of weird boner from having a bunch of lazy fucks being able to peer inside and drool over their fitness or something.Whatever the reason, the campus gym was no different—and Sanji was pretty sure he'd just seen a flash of green hair inside.Only one dumbfuck he knew had green hair.

 

He'd stopped dead in his tracks, taking the last drag off of his cigarette as he glanced over his shoulder.There weren't any people around.Not that it fucking mattered. After stubbing his cigarette out on the rim of a trashcan, he took a few steps closer to the nearest window, until he was close enough to the glass to see a little more clearly inside.Yep, he was right—it was his fucking roommate.The motherfucking _fencer._

 

Sanji cupped his hands around his eyes, leaning against the glass as Zoro squared off against his opponent. He looked fucking hilarious, with his arm raised up behind him like that. He looked like a Musketeer. 

 

There wasn’t a lot of leaping or jumping and dodging like Sanji imagined there to be. Rather, it was much more controlled than all that. A lot faster. 

 

Sanji meant to laugh, but he was distracted. Zoro stood still, watching his opponent up to the exact second that she moved. And the motion was so quick that Sanji’s eyes couldn’t follow, and he assumed all the people standing around the match that looked like judges couldn’t follow either, because the two people with the swords—foils? Uh… what were they called… anyway—Zoro and his partner separated, and his opponent motioned to those standing at each corner of the ring. 

 

The tip of Sanji’s nose touched the glass. 

 

The point went to Zoro, seemingly. 

 

Sanji hadn’t even seen him make contact. 

 

They squared off again and every time the girl—Zoro’s opponent—made a lunge for him, Zoro kind of spun his foil thing around hers and knocked it away. And when he went for her, it was so quick, he threw his left arm back and extended his right so far, he stabbed her right in the side. Well, he didn’t really stab her. Sanji saw his saber—saber was what they were called, that’s right—bend under the pressure. 

 

They took their masks off, and the cute girl smiled at him, shaking her head, and Sanji was stuck watching her for a few seconds before looking back at Zoro, who wasn’t even fucking sweating. 

 

He looked silly as hell. But fuck, it was a little badass.

 

Like, okay, he'd heard that this was the thing Zoro did—that apparently the idiot actually managed to get some kind of sports scholarship for it—but to hear it and to see it actually happening were two totally different things.For several incomprehensible moments, Sanji just stared at him.

 

Even though he was trying to casually stand outside the giant window like he was just killing time, he felt like his face was practically pressed against the glass like some kind of fucking creep.

 

He should probably go. Someone on the Sabaody Fencing Team was going to see him. All Zoro had to do was turn his head. Which would be embarrassing. And Sanji went to pull himself from the window and go about his day, but—

 

Zoro put his mask back on, and he faced a different opponent—a guy taller than him, who seemed to pose no more challenge to Zoro than the first girl had. Although that girl had looked really good doing the whole sword fighting thing. 

 

Zoro didn’t look in Sanji’s direction even once.

 

The level of focus was sort of mystifying.Sanji was skilled at bouncing around and doing thirty different things simultaneously—partially thanks to his lifetime in a kitchen—but to concentrate so intensely on just one thing for that long was unimaginable.He couldn't even study like that; he had to take constant breaks, had to chain smoke, or maybe stop and make a phone call or turn on the TV for a few minutes or something. 

 

In fact, after watching less than ten minutes, Sanji already felt his concentration starting to drift; but meanwhile, sparring match after match, never once did Zoro falter.

 

After several matches all in a row, Zoro didn't lose. Not once. 

 

Well. Maybe he was pretty fucking good. He did have a scholarship and all. He was almost kind of... graceful. 

 

Wow, fucking gross, was that really the word he wanted to use?

 

Zoro was built like a linebacker—they were the bulky muscle guys on a football team, right? Right—and this looked more like a sport for someone built like a gymnast, or maybe even a dancer.It was kind of like a dance, in a way.

 

Ugh. _Ugh._ Again, another awful thought.What the hell was wrong with him today?Fully disgusted with himself, he abruptly turned on his heel and headed toward his next class that he would still be way too early for.

 

If Zoro could concentrate like that, why the hell were his grades so shitty?

 

It didn't matter—nothing about that bastard made any sense to him, and he wasn't worth the energy to think about.

 

He slouched down in a seat near the front and edge of the Business Ethics classroom and made a half-hearted attempt to flip through the textbook.  

 

As Professor Califa took her place at the front of the room, Sanji watched out of the corner of his eye as Zoro rushed to make it inside the classroom just in time.Idiot must've spent too long _practicing_.Ah, shit, he almost cracked a smile at that.

 

At the end of the class, Califa returned one of their assignments from last week.Sanji smirked as he saw the 98 at the top of the page—very typical of her.Even if it was perfect, she'd find a reason for shaving off a couple of points, like it was physically impossible for her to write the number 100.He skimmed the one small comment she'd made—two point deduction.In a question about a breach of contact, he hadn't used the actual _word_ consideration.Fine.Okay.Not really necessary because of how he'd explained it, but he got a 98, no need to worry about it any further.  

 

Class let out and Sanji found himself walking just a few steps behind Zoro when they got outside.He was walking at an excruciating slow pace, and Sanji nearly breezed right past him out of irritation, but when he noticed the deep frown on Zoro's face, he paused.His gaze shifted to the rumpled paper clutched in his hand.It was heavily marred with red ink and the score circled at the top of the page was pretty fucking dismal. 

 

“You've got to be kidding me,” Sanji said aloud, snatching the paper from Zoro's grip quicker than he could react—and Sanji was actually a little impressed with himself, because he knew Zoro could react pretty quickly.Must be all those reflexes he honed as a _fencer—_ it took a lot of composure for him to not to break into a laugh at the thought.

 

“ Hey!” Zoro shouted, and he spun around, gaping at Sanji, who'd stopped in his place to read through some of the paragraphs that had been sliced and diced by Professor Califa's red pen.

 

Wow, and it was... Really bad.Forget missing _one_ element of contract, Zoro hadn't even managed to get _any_ of the four.In fact, as Sanji skimmed the page, he was fairly sure Zoro didn't quite get was a breach of contract _was_.

 

It was kind on infuriating, actually.Was it possible to miss the point _this much_?

 

“ You’re godawful at this,” Sanji commented, carefully maintaining an air of amusement, holding the paper up for Zoro to see.On one hand, it _was_ amusing—and on the other hand, he sure as hell didn't want Zoro to realize he was bugged by it, not even a little bit.

 

“ Fuck off. And give that back,” Zoro said, furrowing his eyebrows a bit.He looked kind of tired.Well, more tired than usual.

 

“ You sure you’re cut out for this business shit?” Sanji asked, holding the paper back out to him, and Zoro yanked it back and folded it several times, jamming it in his pocket. 

 

“ Are you always this fucking nosy?” Zoro responded, and Sanji smiled a little. 

 

Sanji shrugged, as he pulled his pack of cigarettes out of his pocket.They'd gotten a little smashed. Well.

 

Zoro turned and started walking, and Sanji nonchalantly kept stride with him, even as he lit his cigarette—they were going to the same place after all, unfortunately—and Zoro said nothing. 

 

“ Why’re you so awful at this? I remember last year, you were shitty, too. Why'd you pick business, anyway?” Sanji asked, taking a leisurely drag off of his cigarette. 

 

“I was a lot shittier in my last major—not that it's any of your  goddamn business.” 

 

“That's pretty impressive,”  Sanji quipped, and Zoro clenched his hands into fists.

 

“ I’ll get my shit together.” 

 

“ Sure.” It actually wasn't the first time Sanji'd noticed that Zoro had something come back  with embarrassing marks.“Your overall grade in there has to be pretty fucking lousy, right?”

 

“Says the guy who gets praise from the teacher to compensate constant rejection from everyone else.”

 

Scratch that, fuck him, to bomb a paper that badly—he deserved the bad grade.Let him spend eight years getting his bachelor's degree, see if he cared.

 

Seriously, it wasn't just annoying, it was goddamn infuriating.Okay, Sanji didn't really _like_ Zoro.Actually, he hated him, literally hated him.But at the same time, when he watched him fail this shit over and over again—the spring semester was like that, and this semester wasn't off to a better start, for sure—it frustrated him.

 

It made him feel impatient.

 

He resolved not to think about it anymore, and he was actually pretty successful, because the next few days were obnoxiously insane.Friday came, and that stupid paper was due, and after two classes, he had to go to straight to work.

 

After what felt like the longest, stupidest shift in awhile, Sanji finally made it back home.He intended on going straight to bed—he didn't even want to think about how sleep deprived he was. 

 

Before he even had the chance to click the door closed behind him, a far too enthusiastic voice greeted him, the loud pitch uncomfortably sharp against his eardrums.The greeting wasn't unwelcome, it was just—it was really fucking loud.

 

“Sanji, you're finally home!” Luffy shouted, which was wholly unnecessary, since he was sitting at the dining table that was literally ten feet away from the front door, tops, but it was his preferred decibel, probably. 

 

Sucking on his cigarette, drawing in a jagged breath, Sanji nodded as he glanced at the stranger at the table sitting across from Luffy and Usopp.Despite the mild fall evening, the guy was wearing a black winter cap that seemed to nearly swallow his head, the brim mostly shielding his eyes, so only his nose and mouth were visible.

 

It was a really dumb look.

 

“Tralagal brought meat, so we were hoping you'd cook it for us,” Luffy went on.

 

Tralagal?Sanji's eyes wandered to the man in the hat again.  

 

“You'll do it, right, Sanji?” 

 

“Please,” Usopp added, craning his neck to look back at Sanji, concern painted over his face. What the hell, was Usopp starting to grow a beard? “Otherwise I'm going to have to cook it, and—” 

 

“I'll do it,” Sanji said, raising his hand to make him stop, choosing to ignore his facial hair for the time being.“I—I can cook it, whatever it is, just, let me get changed first.” 

 

So much for sleep.But Luffy and Usopp had asked him to do a thing—a thing that they would absolutely fuck up if given the chance—and fuck, they were his fucking friends. Sanji was totally powerless.

 

How many hours had he been awake, anyway?No, he didn't want to know—he'd gotten up at the asscrack of dawn, after maybe two hours of sleep, tops, to finish that stupid fucking  Managerial Economics  paper.After two classes, he'd had to rush straight to work from the campus, because the asshole who did the schedule put him on way earlier than he was supposed to be.

 

And it just didn't end.Someone had overbooked the reservations again—probably that shithead shift manager Fullbody—so it had been a nightmare in the kitchens.By the time the last customers left and everyone was cleaned up in the back, it was nearly two hours later than he would have normally gotten out.

 

In fact, he hadn't gotten much sleep any night that week.If the human body actually needed to repay its sleep deficit, Sanji'd probably have to catch up with a lengthy coma. Might be nice.

 

Trying not to drag his tired feet, Sanji nearly walked headlong into a dark-haired man, several inches taller than him, who must've come from the bathroom at the end of the hall.

 

Taking a fluid sidestep, Sanji pulled his cigarette out of his mouth, craning his neck slightly to get a better look at his face.Oh, good, another asshole wearing a hat.“Wasn't paying attention, sorry.”

 

“Neither was I,” the tall man replied quietly.A shiver ran up Sanji's spine at the sound of his voice—it was somehow silky but chilling, its flat tone startling devoid of emotion.Sanji narrowed his eyes, studying the stranger's expressionless face—the guy's tired eyes were heavily accented by impossibly dark circles underneath.

 

He looked exactly how Sanji felt, actually.

 

The tall man reached up to grab the edge of his hat, adjusting it indiscernibly.Sanji raised an eyebrow, noting the tattoos on his fingers. EATH?What the hell is that?

 

But then the other man smoothly slipped past him and Sanji remembered just how desperately he'd been wanting to change his clothes for the past few hours.He headed up to his room and peeled off the white double-breasted jacket that was part of his tawdry, cliché work uniform.Some asshole had accidentally knocked a plate right into him and he hoped he never had to smell duck confit again.

 

Bursting out of his room in clean button-down shirt and a fresh pair of slacks, his second wind started to kick in—or maybe his third or fourth, it was hard to keep track anymore—and he felt ready to get back to cooking, even if it had been the thing he had been doing for the last several hours.With a bit more of a beat in his step, he stuck a new cigarette in his mouth and returned to the group downstairs.

 

"I heard you brought meat... Tralagal, is it?" Sanji asked, his gaze falling on the man with the ridiculous arctic-weather hat nearly covering his eyes.

 

"Oh, that's not Tralawful, that's Penguin," Luffy told him.

 

"Penguin...?" Sanji repeated.The hell is up with these guys' names?

 

Penguin smiled disarmingly."Nice to meet ya.Sanji, right?"

 

“Yeah.”Sanji's gaze shifted to the man with the tattoos."So you're Trala—”

 

"Trafalgar Law," he replied flatly.

 

"Oh. I, uh... must've heard wrong.”

 

"You didn't, unfortunately.But call me Law, it's easier that way."His voice stayed eerily level as he spoke.Law narrowed his eyes, glancing at Luffy, who was sitting next to him, grinning."I always tell him the same thing."

 

“Will you cook now, Sanji?”Luffy asked eagerly, ignoring—or maybe oblivious to—the blatant creep factor Law had going on.

 

“Yeah.Is the meat in the fridge?”

 

“I'll go with you,” Law said, rising to his feet, calmly ambling into the kitchen ahead of Sanji. 

 

“Uh, it's okay, I can handle it,” Sanji replied, tugging at the collar of his shirt—like, fuck this guy. It was weird to have some stranger lead him into his own fucking kitchen.

 

“You'll see,” Law responded.  

 

Fucking cryptic, but, fine.He stubbed out his cigarette in an ashtray at the edge of the kitchen counter before he met Law at the refrigerator.

 

Sanji's edginess quickly subsided when Law leaned down and pulled out an enormous cut of meat from the bottom row. Sanji easily recognized it as being an entire half of a short loin.

 

“What the fuck,” he murmured, pressing a finger to his lips, staring at the oversized hunk of meat.“Where did you even get this?It's got to be over ten pounds.”

 

“Twelve and a half,” Law replied, setting the cut of beef, which was wrapped in a thin plastic sheet, on the top of the counter.  

 

Jaw slightly agape, Sanji studied it carefully, growing further impressed because for real, what the fuck.“The grade of it, too.It's top quality.Perfect marbling—where did you get it?”

 

“I work at a carnicería.” 

 

Sanji raised an eyebrow.“Huh.Well, yeah, that's better than most of the grocery store butcher shops we have around here, but this must've cost a lot.”

 

“Let's say I got an employee discount,” Law told him, nonchalantly perusing Sanji's knife block.He smiled faintly as he pulled out a 12-inch butcher knife.“You have a good selection here.Tell me how you want the pieces cut.”

 

“Oh, there's no need to do that, I can take care of it,” Sanji told him—although as he mulled it over, he hadn't worked with such a large cut of meat many times before.Even the steaks at Mariejois came pre-cut.

 

“It's alright.It can be difficult to butcher this cut.”The faint smile increased slightly.“I'm not a cook, but I'm pretty good at slicing into meat."

 

Sanji sucked in an uneasy breath—what weird fucking phrasing.As he started grabbing other ingredients to prepare a side to go with the steaks, his gaze kept drifting back to Law's hands.

 

The hair on the back of his neck stood up as he realized what the tattoos along the digits of his fingers spelled: _DEATH_.Yet as he watched him handle the bulky knife with chilling precision, it seemed almost fitting; like he was born to slice up flesh and bone.  

 

An involuntary shudder ran up Sanji's spine as he forced his attention back to chopping garlic into immaculately minced pieces.Everything about this guy was really fucking eerie. Slipping into auto-pilot, his mind started to wander.

 

Didn't they watch some documentary of Luffy's where several seemingly-autopsied bodies were found abandoned somewhere in South America—or maybe it was Central America?They were cut with startling perfection, more skilled than most surgeons, and certainly better than any of the rural country doctors in the area.

 

An eyewitness had seen one of the victims being taken away by a group of tall, limber beings that seemed almost inhuman.  

 

What the fuck was with Luffy and his alien DVDs?

 

Sanji's eyes drifted back to Law again, and he realized his mind was wandering down a really dumb track.Okay, he had better start a conversation.  

 

"So, uh, a carnicería, huh.How long have you been doing that?"

 

"Three years."

 

"That's a pretty long time.Learn some Spanish there?"

 

"I already spoke it.Spanish and French, actually." Law cast a sidelong glance at him."We can speak in it, if you prefer," he added in unwelcomely perfect French.

 

Oh shut the fuck up.

 

Sanji pressed his lips into a thin line as he asked in English, totally ignoring Law’s statement, “How do you know Luffy?

 

“We had a class together.” 

 

Oh.So apparently Luffy roaming around campus like he belonged there wasn't a new thing.Sanji narrowed his eyes, turning to look at Law. “You know that Luffy isn't.Well, uh, he's never been...”

 

“A student?” Eyes that looked half dead momentarily glanced over at him.“Mmhmm, I learned shortly after.”

 

The lines Sanji failed to realize had been forming on his forehead suddenly relaxed—he was actually a little relieved, because he wasn't looking forward to breaking the news of the truth about Luffy to this freakshow.“Uh, good.That's good.That misunderstanding has come up a couple of times before.” More than a couple.

 

Law nodded.“Unfortunately for me, he'd already learned where I worked, so I could never really get rid of him after that.”

 

Sanji inadvertently let a small laugh leave his throat—even this weirdo had been ensnared by Luffy's illogical tenacity toward food.He also realized this must've been the guy who Luffy had gotten all that meat from the very first time he'd visited this house—unless Luffy had a couple more butcher friends.Well, that wouldn't be surprising, either.

 

But the momentary reprieve from the uncomfortable feeling weighing down his chest vanished when Law soundlessly sidled up beside him, knife still clutched in his hand—the bloody knife, deftly gripped by hands that literally exhibited death.  

 

Well, they pretty much screamed the word.All caps.DEATH!Jesus Christ.This guy was creepy as fuck.

 

Law brushed past him to put the knife in the sink and wash his hands."I'll leave the rest to you, then."

 

“ _Thank_ you,” Sanji said, unintentionally being a bit more dickish than he’d intended. 

 

He just decided to prepare a heaping amount of food, per usual, despite the fact that Usopp and Luffy were the only two people sitting at the table that he gave a shit about. Chopper was hiding in his room, and Nami was at her bartending job, and who the fuck cared where Zoro was. But he cooked enough for all of his roommates. Plenty for Penguin and Law, too.

 

When the food was ready, he had Luffy fetch Chopper and force him to come eat a meal outside of his room for a change, it was goddamn Friday night, after all.

 

Luffy ate a breathtaking amount, exclaiming through a full mouth, “Trafunkhouse always brings the best meat,” as he noisily clapped Law on the shoulder several times.

 

Law pursed his lips together.

 

"Oh, speaking of which, Tralala,” Luffy started, nudging Law in the ribcage hard enough to make the creepo lurch forward a little and narrow his eyes at Luffy.“Chopper's going to be a doctor, too.”

 

Uh.How... how the fuck was that related?Sanji raised his eyebrows incrementally.Actually, nope, fuck that, he didn't want to know.

 

A fork crashed onto porcelain with an unreasonable clatter, and Sanji's neck snapped upward at the sound.It was from Chopper, who was suddenly staring wide-eyed at Law like he was some kind of goddamn movie star.

 

“Oh! You're going to be a doctor? Are you in premed now?" he asked animatedly, despite the fact that he had only said a few jittery words since he got to the table; he had been particularly skittish around the sketchy guests at their table.Go figure.

 

Law nodded slowly, and Sanji's gaze fell to the way he loosely clung to the fork in his hand as he spoke.“Mmhmm.I'll be graduating in spring.”

 

“Really?” Chopper gawked at Law, his already large eyes impossibly wide with excitement. “I've barely met anyone in premed since I've been here.Almost all of my classes are math and sciences right now.”

 

Law shifted his grip on his fork, sliding it between two fingers of his right hand—marked with an _A_ and a _T_ —as he let the utensil gently settle onto the top of his plate.“Well, that's how it is for everyone the first year or so.”

 

As a flurry of doctor-jargon flew out of Chopper's mouth, Sanji wearily rose to his feet and started to automatically clear the empty plates.  

 

“Sanji, can you make me that one drink?” Luffy asked.It shouldn't have been enough for Sanji to know what he meant, but it actually was.

 

“I guess,” he frowned; he was dead on his feet at this point and just kind of wanted to sleep.But hell, he was making Luffy a rum and coke with a twist of lime, might as well have a drink himself.

 

Might as well make sure everyone had a drink.Shit.  

 

Whatever.

 

He didn't know _why_ he did shit like this, but it was like second-nature, like his body moved before he could even think about it—the curse of growing up in the service industry, probably.Even if he wasn't pleasant about it, he'd make sure their needs were met.He wished Nami was there.

 

Sanji made a round of cocktails and beers, served them up like he was a damned bartender or something—even making Chopper a sweet and fruity drink with just a hint of coconut rum, so slight he would barely taste it, although it would be more than enough to give him an enviable buzz.

 

Then he opened a bottle of wine for himself—Sutter Home, terrible stuff, but for three bucks a bottle, there was no reason not to pick up an entire case of disgusting sadness at a time—and after pouring an absurdly full glass, he returned to the table.

 

“Hmm, but it seems if you humanize the cadavers in that way, you won't be able to focus on the lesson,” Law said.

 

Sanji's brow wrinkled.What the fuck kind of conversation did he just walk into?He took a very long swallow of his merlot.Yeah, it was as terrible as he remembered.

 

“But if you de-humanize—if you try to detach yourself from the people you're learning to save, then how can you call yourself a doctor?” Chopped replied emphatically.His impassioned tone was starkly opposite to Law's monotone.

 

Law raised a hand, gracefully twisting it with a mesmerizing aloofness.“If you want to call yourself a doctor, then why is it necessary to do one or the other?At some point, to heal and to help is to cut—shouldn't it be second nature to slice into human flesh like the steak you just ate?”He leaned an elbow on the table, haughtily resting his hand on his chin, and Chopper suddenly looked a little green.

 

How fucking gross. Fuck this guy. Food was food. People were people. There was a fucking difference.

 

His expression slowly formed into a scowl.Who the fuck would want this guy for a doctor, anyway?

 

Usopp's cell phone, which had been intermittently buzzing the entire time Sanji had been there, went off yet again as Sanji stood up to refill the glass that he'd finished before he meant to.  

 

As Usopp shifted his position, wriggling the phone out of his pocket for the umpteenth time, Sanji could see he'd gotten a lengthy text message that took up a large portion of the screen.Usopp's brows twisted in concern; he was pretty shitty about covering up his expressions. 

 

“Hey guys, I'm gonna head out for a bit,” Usopp said, trying to make his voice sound natural and nonchalant, despite the ridiculously obvious furrow in his brow.  

 

“You are?” Luffy said, his face falling a bit.

 

“Yeah, I'm, uh, I'm gonna go meet up with Nami,” he explained.“I won't be too long.”

 

“Oh, good, bring her here!”

 

“That's the plan,” Usopp assured him.“It'll be a little bit, though.”

 

“Everything okay?” Sanji asked lightly.

 

“Yeah, uh, no big deal. She's got to stay at work longer than she thought, but we'll come back here as soon as she's off.”  

 

“She?You have girls living here, too?” Penguin perked up.

 

“Uh, yeah,” Usopp said.“Well, I mean, Nami's the only one.”

 

“Ah, it must be nice to have female roommates,” he sighed wistfully, resting his chin in his hands, with a dreamy smile on his face.Sanji momentarily entertained the idea of smashing it.

 

But then Luffy grabbed Law by the sleeve, yanking him hard enough to pull him sideways a few inches.“Oh, Trafalcon, I just remembered, I got that stuff we were talking about.”

 

The stuff?That sounded questionable as hell, and maybe, just a little interesting.Sanji's eyes shifted between the two men with practiced disinterest.

 

Law glowered at him.“I have no idea what you're talking about.”

 

“The liquor you wanted,” Luffy explained, loosening his grip, but not removing his hand.  

 

Law's expression darkened.“I never said I _wanted_ that.I said I went through a phase where I drank a lot of it.”

 

“If this is what I think, then no fucking way,” Penguin started, shaking his head. 

 

“I'm gonna go get the bottle,” Luffy declared, standing with confidence.

 

“I didn't say I'd have any.”Law gave him a serious look.“I don't even know why I'm here—I barely have any free time, I don't know how I let you convince me to come over.”

 

 “Come on, just one!”

 

Law raised his hand to his face, pinching the bridge of his nose in frustration.And then, with a sigh, he removed his hand, pointing his index finger at Luffy, giving him a refined tap in the center of his chest before he held the index finger straight up in the air.

 

“One.”

 

It was a one.But all Sanji could see was that upside-down _T_.

 

Luffy clapped Law on his back cheerfully before he disappeared down the hallway.Sanji could actually hear his footsteps stomping down, and then up, the basement stairs.When he returned a moment later, he brandished an all-too-recognizable green bottle.Well.That was fucking disappointing.  

 

It was just a goddamn bottle of Jägermeister. 

 

Wordlessly, Sanji got up to fetch five shot glasses from the kitchen—because there was literally no way to mix it and make it even fractionally appealing.  

 

Law poured the shots without letting a single drop get away from him.

 

Chopper regarded it like it was poison. “Is there something wrong with it?” 

 

Sanji snorted.“Smell it.” 

 

The look on Chopper's face said it all, but before he could protest, everyone started clinking their shot glasses, and Chopper was too flustered and lost in the momentum to do anything but pour the murky black liquid down his throat.  

 

Yep, that was fucking disgusting.Sanji swallowed, ignoring the burn, trying to ignore that fucking gross licorice flavor, and took a heavy drag from his cigarette.

 

Chopper nearly choked.Coughing, he chugged the rest of his sweet rum cocktail in the stead of a chaser.  

 

The poor kid probably had a bad night in store how him, Sanji realized.Oh well, it was a rite of passage.

 

Sanji felt some vague comfort in Law's insistence that they would stop at one shot—but Luffy was a persuasive bastard, and even though Law acted like he barely tolerated Luffy, he buckled every time.So a second shot was poured.Then a third.Fuck.  

 

“But there were _sharks_ that day,” Luffy was saying, and Sanji was pretty much chugging his merlot now, because it was sort of the same as drinking water after the Jäg.

 

“There was _one_ shark,” Law corrected, his sigh laced with exasperation.He turned toward Chopper and Sanji—presumably Penguin must have already been familiar with this story, as he was mindlessly scrolling through something on his phone—and started to explain. “For most of the animals, the school could only get their hands on one or two of them, so the professors usually did the dissection so everyone got the benefit of seeing all of the pieces.”

 

“Uh, what class did you say this was?” Sanji asked uneasily.He had thankfully managed to avoid any classes involving scalpels and formaldehyde. 

 

“Zoology.The lab part of it.”

 

“I wonder if I should take that,” Chopper pondered aloud, with a slight slur.He leaned forward on the table, his eyes drooping a bit comically.  

 

“Well, I'm going to be a surgeon, so I took any class I could with dissections, but it may not be that helpful to you,” Law told him.

 

Sanji pressed his lips into a tight frown.He wondered how drunk he would get if he took a drink every time this tattoo freak mentioned cutting into dead things or something equally gruesome.Blackout, probably.  

 

“Chopper should take it, shouldn't he, Traflailer?” Luffy burst in, leaning hard against Law, pushing him over a little.“It's a really cool class.We got to see the inside of an eyeball!”

 

Law aimed a disparaging look at Luffy.“Quit saying it like you actually took the class.”

 

Sanji's gaze drifted from Luffy's shoulder rubbing up against Law’s to the look of straight exasperation on Law’s face.

 

Somewhere along the way, a fourth shot was poured, and Sanji took it and he didn't even know if he was tired or drunk anymore.His wine bottle was empty; maybe he'd open another one.

 

And goddammit, for some reason they were _still talking_ about cutting into shit, too.  

 

“But what about—I mean, what's that gonna be like, really sewing somebody up for the first time?I mean, not like an animal or something, like a real human being.” Chopper's slur grew incrementally worse, and he slumped forward even further now, knobby elbows on the table, clearly struggling to hold his head upright.

 

Law shrugged, setting his hand down flat on the table.Sanji shifted uncomfortably as the word _DEATH_ seemed to be fucking directed toward him.“I think you're over-thinking it.When it comes up, you do it.I've never even thought about a reason to hesitate or feel weird about it.”

 

“Huh, I don't kn—Wait, wait, but, hold on. You say it like—wait, have you actually done it?” Chopper asked, and words were clearly getting hard.

 

“I've had to a few times, yes.”

 

“But how?” His eyes widened.“We're not allowed to.Not as premed students!”

 

"Haven't you ever seen Luffy's chest?" Law asked, his eyebrows raised just a little. 

 

"No...?" Chopper replied slowly, sitting back in his seat. 

 

"Oh, really?" Luffy cut in, plunking his glass down on the table. "Check it out!" And he pulled his shirt up to his collar bone, revealing an enormous scar across his chest. 

 

Sanji stared at it from behind his drink, sipping it slowly. He'd noticed part of it peeking up from Luffy's collar a few times but had never asked about its origins.

 

Law smiled a little from under the brim of his stupid fucking hat. "That's my handiwork."

 

“Oh my god.You wouldn't be allowed in med school if someone found out you did that,” Chopper cried out, gaping at Law like he'd just admitted to murdering a puppy or something.

 

Law shrugged.“If someone showed up on your doorstep at three in the morning and told you to fix them up, you might not have much of a choice.The police aren't exactly going to come banging down your door for it.”

 

“Yeah, you really saved my neck that time, Trafickle,” Luffy grinned, giving Law a small slap on the back of his shoulder.  

 

Chopper asked several dozen rapid-fire and horribly jumbled questions about how Law had patched Luffy up, and why Luffy hadn't gone to see a real doctor, but Sanji started to tune out his younger roommate.Instead, his gaze shifted back and forth between Law and Luffy.It seemed a little weird that they were friends.But, maybe not, with Luffy being Luffy.

 

Most importantly, it was getting really fucking late.Like, way past the time that Nami usually got off work.Where the hell were Nami and Usopp?Shit, he should just go to bed—but no, no, he could just wait just a _little_ longer.He wanted Nami to taste his exquisite steak dinner, after all.

 

The group eventually relocated from the dining table to the couches just a few feet away.Chopper was lying face-down on the loveseat, presumably passed out.He'd held up pretty well, all things considered.He'd probably puke later.The rest of them were on the couches, but Sanji opted to sit on one of the barstools by the kitchen counter; easiest place to hover over an ashtray.

 

The ashtray was getting pretty full.

 

By the time Nami finally came home, with Usopp trailing behind her, it literally hurt to keep his eyes open.But the moment he saw her, Sanji quickly jumped to his feet, greeting her and informing he'd cook her dinner because they had _so much_ steak. 

 

“Uh, thanks, Sanji,” she said, holding back a yawn.“But it's like two thirty in the morning, I don't think I can eat something like that right now.”

 

“Oh. Yeah. Fucking duh, I’m an idiot,” he said, trying to smile, but he was so fucking tired and _fucking obviously_ she wouldn’t want fifty pounds of steak just before going to bed.

 

“Make it for me tomorrow, though?” she smiled, and her smile gave him a surge of energy.

 

“You don't even need to ask.”

 

“It was really good,” Usopp added, waving goodnight as he and Nami headed off to bed.

 

The temporary influx of energy instantly faded as she disappeared from his sight.He smoked one more cigarette before he made the seemingly endless march up to his room, where he barely managed to kick off his shoes before passing out on the bed.

 

 

* * *

 

A muscular arm appeared from beneath a pile of tangled sheets, clumsily groping at a slightly banged up cell phone, until a fingertip finally hit the section of screen that would turn off the offensive alarm.

 

Zoro sat up and rubbed his eyes. Damn, definitely more tired than usual.

 

This middle-of-the-damn-night job really might not work out.It'd only been a week, though, so maybe it'd get easier.Even if it didn't, he sure as hell didn't have any other prospects.

 

Forcing himself out of bed, he lazily dug through a drawer until he'd produced enough clothes to consider himself dressed for the day.At least clothes were something he could keep uncomplicated. Sweats and track pants.T-shirts and sweatshirts. White socks, all the same type and generic off-brand, so he never had to match a pair.  

 

Next, he gathered all the shit he was going to need for the day, loading up a gym bag and a backpack.Practice first, then a study group.He actually really wanted to skip the study group, though; the classmates he was meeting were kind of assholes to him, and he got the feeling they wished he wouldn't come, but fuck them and the stick up their asses, there was a test coming up and he needed to pass it.After that, he'd probably a nap for awhile before work.  

 

His shift didn't even start until midnight.  

 

But Zoro had to admit, he was actually sort of fortunate he'd found something so quickly, since his last job as a hotel valet had ended... abruptly.  

 

He'd thought the valet thing would be easy.Drive a car a couple blocks away, walk back.When someone came to retrieve their car, walk over there again, drive it to the front, and hopefully get a tip out of the deal.What could be complicated about that?And the hours were good, too—late enough to not interfere with any of his classes, but they never kept him past ten unless there was some kind of event going on.

 

But beyond that, it, well, totally blew. In fact, it made Zoro feel like his entire life was supposed to be a stupid memorization game—like he didn't get enough of that with classes.  

 

Remember what all these makes and models of cars look like (what the hell, he couldn't tell the difference between a BMW and a Mercedes to save his life), memorize where they were parked (if the hotel had just numbered the spaces, it would've made it easier to find shit, plus there were _two_ different garages?!), make sure he knew where to drive and walk, and deal with all the busy roads that might be backed up if traffic was particularly horrific that night.And it was bad most nights, so even that two block drive could result in a slight detour if he couldn't get into the right lane in time.

 

But even if he hated the job, he hadn't wanted to _lose_ it.But one night—his _last_ night there, as it turned out—he'd missed a turn, had to reroute, had to reroute again, some asshole cut him off when he tried to get into a turn lane, he'd maybe gotten a _little_ turned around, and long story short, he'd taken twenty-five minutes to get some asshole's beamer back to the hotel.  

 

He'd been fired on the spot.

 

So the new job... Shit-shift aside, restocking a toy store at night wasn't the worst gig out there.It was easy and didn't require a whole lot of thinking.No _memorization_.Besides, there were a lot of nights he was up till four or five a.m. anyway, and he needed money.  

 

Why the hell was he thinking about all of this so early in the morning?Slinging his two heavy bags over his shoulder, he quietly exited his room and started heading down the stairs.  

 

As he neared the bottom, he heard the familiar creak of the basement door opening.He preemptively turned his head in the direction the sound came from so he could greet Luffy, but to his surprise, that wasn't who he saw.  

 

A tall man with dark, tossled hair clicked the basement door closed behind him.As his hand clutched the doorknob, Zoro noticed he had some kind of black shit all over his hands—tattoos?Yeah, they were.Some of them were letters too; but he didn't really care what they said.  

 

The tall man turned around and looked at him, void of expression.He kind of looked like he hadn't slept in months.

 

Who the hell was this guy?And what was he doing in Luffy's room?Come to think of it, Zoro'd never even been down there.

 

“Good morning,” the strange man said, nodding slightly.

 

“Uh, morning,” Zoro replied.

 

Then the dark-haired man brushed past him and briskly headed for the front door, without saying another word. 

 

Shrugging, Zoro let his gym bag and backpack tumble onto the couch before he headed into the kitchen to drink some water before he left.It would've been awkward to walk outside with that guy, anyway.He didn't feel like making small talk with anybody right now.  

 

Once what he considered a safe stretch of time had passed, he picked up his bags and started to head toward campus.Other than practice, which was probably one of the few things he actually _liked_ doing, his day was about as godawful as he'd expected.

 

His next day off of work was a Tuesday night.  

 

Zoro didn't have to do anything after his afternoon class, so, as soon as he'd gotten home, he'd just sort of flopped onto one of the old couches, letting his backpack tumble onto the floor.He'd somehow managed to pull off a pretty decent grade on the test he'd been meeting with that annoying study group for, and he was feeling better than he had in awhile.Within a matter of minutes, he passed out.

 

He awoke to the front door slamming closed.A bit bleary-eyed, he rolled around to see it was Luffy.Come to think of it, he hadn't seen him for the past two days.Luffy smiled and waved hello, and Zoro noticed the old red sweatshirt he was wearing was torn in a few places and full of dirt.But that was maybe how it always looked—Luffy's clothes always looked like he'd pulled them out of the reject bin at a thrift store.Actually, he probably had.

 

He dozed off again, and the second time he woke up, it was Nami walking through the door. Almost before she was inside, Luffy, from somewhere behind Zoro—somewhere near the kitchen, sounded like—shouted his greeting to her. 

 

“Hey, Nami! Welcome home! Hey, I’m going to a show tonight—do you wanna come?” 

 

“Sure,” Nami replied after considering Luffy’s invitation for a few seconds. 

 

Zoro sat up and looked over the back of the couch to see Luffy sitting at the kitchen bar, freshly showered and still dripping wet, eating all the leftovers from yesterday’s dinner that probably all of them would’ve liked to have. 

 

Luffy grinned. “Awesome. Lets go get Usopp and Sanji to go with us.” 

 

“You should probably hurry up and finish that before Sanji realizes you’re eating all of it,” Nami pointed out, and Luffy looked back down at his plate. 

 

“Shit, you’re right. Okay, two seconds.” And he wasn’t kidding. It took about two seconds for Luffy to shove all the food that was left—enough to feed a couple people, probably—into his mouth. 

 

Luffy burped and Nami made a face and he left the dish in the sink, running to catch up with Nami, who was already walking upstairs. 

 

Zoro watched them go and rubbed his eyes. He looked back at the television, which was turned on now. Luffy had been watching another alien documentary.What a surprise.

 

Zoro had seen more alien and UFO documentaries in the past month than he had in his life. He had no idea how many DVDs Luffy had, but so far, they were all about aliens, and it didn’t seem like Luffy had even started coming close to exhausting his supply. 

 

He wondered very, very briefly why Luffy would invite Nami to a show and not him, but then again, there was really no way Zoro would want to just go to a show with Luffy without knowing further details. He didn’t necessarily like going out with everyone, but he’d wound up doing just that a few times now since he’d moved in with them. He wasn’t sure how he kept finding himself in those situations. 

 

After about twenty minutes—enough time for Zoro to grab a beer and watch some nut with round glasses and hair that looked like it’d just been vacuumed talk about aliens being held captive in the basement of the Pentagon or something—Luffy came downstairs with Nami and Usopp and Sanji in his wake. 

 

“Zoro, look!” Luffy shouted, like Zoro wasn’t already looking right at him. Luffy held his arms out and Zoro, hah, goddamn it, Zoro realized Luffy wasn’t wearing his own clothes. 

 

That had to be Sanji’s grey button-down collared shirt with the sleeves rolled up the same way Sanji always wore his, and those were probably Usopp’s black pants that looked like they actually fit Luffy, rather than the baggy and half-tattered shit Luffy usually wore. Those were Luffy’s own fucking sandals, though. 

 

“Nice sandals,” Zoro said. 

 

“He fought us on it,” Usopp explained, hands going to his pockets. 

 

“He wears the same size shoe as Usopp, even, but no, had to have the fucking sandals,” Sanji sighed, looking Luffy down. 

 

“We tried,” Nami said, putting her hands on her hips. The three of them looked at Luffy like some kind of failed art project. 

 

“I look incredible,” Luffy said, hunched over a little, pulling out the bottom of his—Sanji’s—shirt, checking himself out. 

 

“You look dumb,” Zoro said, taking a sip of his beer. 

 

“I look fresh,” Luffy said, leaning forward, “as _hell_.” The tip of his tongue curled around his upper row of grinning teeth as he accentuated his point. 

 

Zoro snorted. “Whatever you say.” 

 

“Usopp,” Nami said, suddenly looking over at him.   


 

“Yes?”   


 

“You should shave.”   


 

Usopp grinned and rubbed his cheeks. He legitimately could grow a full beard. Zoro was a little impressed. 

 

“I’m good,” Usopp said. 

 

“You should _shave_ ,” Nami said again, and he only laughed. She grimaced and turned to Zoro. “Is that what you’re wearing?” she asked, and Zoro glanced down to see exactly what he was wearing, because it was probably fine, and Nami could shut the hell up and worry about herself for once, he looked alright, and, wait—

 

“I wasn’t planning on going,” Zoro said, leaning back against the armrest of the couch as his other roommates began to advance on him. 

 

“You are too going,” Nami said, sitting down next to Zoro, right in his personal bubble. He leaned away from her.

 

“I’m going to stay here. You guys can have fun at your show.” Zoro narrowed his eyes at her, and she was unaffected, per usual. 

 

“There’ll be lots of alcohol,” Usopp pointed out. “It’s at a bar, apparently.” 

 

"Yeah, your favorite place," Sanji said, grinning at him. Stupid, shit-eating grin.

 

"Just come with us, Zoro. Stop being such a Debbie-downer."Nami scrunched up her face, glaring, leaning even closer to him. Maybe she was trying to look intimidating.

 

Zoro sighed and rubbed his face. “Fine. Just shut up about it. And I’m wearing this, so shut up about that, too.” 

 

“Good,” Nami said, standing up and rubbing the top of his head as she did, mussing up his hair, and he swatted her away. Well. It wasn’t like she could really mess up his hair. He didn’t actually have a hair style. It just… looked the way it did no matter what. 

 

Once he’d rid himself of Nami, he glanced up and saw Luffy, his arms folded over his chest, smiling right at him, and Zoro paused. That fucker. Luffy knew things would play out this way, didn’t he. 

 

_That_ was how Luffy managed to convince him to go places. Fuck.

 

Zoro glared at Luffy, who just laughed, of course, and once Zoro was on his feet, he went to the fridge to grab another beer, because beer at his house was free—or at least paid for already—and beer at a bar was definitely not. After throwing away his empty can and cracking open a new one, he walked around the kitchen counter/bar and down the hall a bit. Everyone was crowding in Chopper’s doorway. Zoro joined them, standing in the back, leaning against the hallway wall. 

 

“Aw, come on, Chopper, you'll probably have a lot of fun,” Nami was saying.

 

“The last _three times_ you've taken me anywhere, it has been anything _but_ fun,” Chopper said emphatically from his room.“Not to mention we all have classes tomorrow, what are you guys thinking?”

 

“ _Most_ nights are school nights,” Usopp pointed out. 

 

“Right. Sleep when you’re dead,” Sanji said, clapping Usopp on the shoulder, agreeing with him, and Chopper frowned. 

 

“That’s awful advice. Sleep is extremely important for brain function. And I have a class at eight o’clock!” 

 

“Well, that’s your dumb fault for having a class that early,” Nami said. “But it’s okay, everyone screws up and takes an early class their first semester in. You’ll know better now.” 

 

“What? What’s wrong with an early class?”

 

“You know,” Zoro said from his spot in the back of the group, “this is at a bar. And it’s not Nami’s bar. You probably have to be twenty-one to get in. Chopper can’t go unless he’s hiding a fake ID with that fake prescription pad he has.” 

 

“I don’t have a fake prescription pad!” Chopper shouted. 

 

Ignoring him, Nami and Luffy turned to Zoro, and simultaneously said: 

 

“I can get him in there.”

 

“Oh, that's not a problem.”

 

They were both overtly confident about it.Zoro's expression was blank, but he was inwardly amused.Yeah, between the two of them, sneaking in a seventeen year old was probably pretty small time. Even if that seventeen year old looked about twelve sometimes.

 

“I have an eight o'clock class and four chapters to read tonight, I _cannot go anywhere,_ ” Chopper said firmly.“I shouldn't even be talking to you all right now.”

 

“Okay, Chopper,” Luffy said suddenly, breaking free of the cluster and walking up to him and clapping him on the back. “Stay here tonight.” 

 

Chopper looked at him wide-eyed, momentarily at a loss. His freckled face almost looked a little crestfallen, maybe. “Um—I mean—“

 

“But you _have to_ come the next time, okay? It’s not the same without you.” 

 

The tense expression on Chopper’s face instantly relaxed. “Is that supposed to make me feel better?” he snorted, uninterested—but as Luffy and the rest of the group went to filter back out to the kitchen, Zoro noticed Chopper’s face was scrunched up like he was trying to suppress a smile. 

 

He was like a little kid. 

 

Luffy convinced them to do a few shots together to kill a little time, because the show didn’t start for a little while, still, and Zoro didn’t know what kind of show was happening at whatever bar they were going to, but in the end, it didn’t really matter. He wasn’t going for the music. 

 

“What kind of bar is this?” Usopp asked, coughing a little after swallowing a mouthful of some sort of honey whiskey. 

 

“A really fun one. There’s always a lot of dancing. Plus, my friend’s going to be in this show—that’s why I’m going.” Luffy spun on his stool, rotating in a slow circle as he spoke. 

 

“Your friend’s in this show? Is he a musician? What instrument does he play?” Usopp asked. 

 

“He’s not a musician—he doesn’t play an instrument, really,” Luffy replied. 

 

“So is he like a DJ?” Sanji asked, pouring another shot into his glass and immediately down his throat after that. 

 

“No, he isn’t—“ 

 

“Well who cares,” Nami cut in, pushing her shot glass towards the center of the counter. “We all look really good—except, mostly just me—and alright, we’re ready, let’s get going already.”

 

The ride there didn’t take too long. They’d all assumed their usual spots in Usopp’s car—with Nami in the front, and him and Sanji on either side of the middle row of seats, and Luffy sitting in the back. Zoro bickered with Sanji, and Usopp and Nami laughed, and Luffy waved at people in the cars behind them from the  third row rear-facing seat. 

 

Luffy gave them decent directions. They’d only had to turn around once. 

 

When they arrived, Sanji pressed his face against the window, squinting up at the neon sign above the entrance. 

 

“The show is at Ivankov’s?” Sanji asked, frowning. 

 

“Yeah!” Luffy said, leaning over the back seat, inviting himself into Sanji’s personal space. 

 

“This is a gay bar,” he said, and Luffy grinned. 

 

“I know that.” 

 

“You’re taking us to a drag show,” Sanji deadpanned, already digging for his cigarettes. 

 

“So you’ve been to one here before? Good, so you know—they're _awesome_ ,” Luffy was climbing into the middle seat between Sanji and Zoro, prompting Zoro to open the door and get out of the car just to make room. 

 

The rest of his roommates exited the station wagon, checking their pockets for their wallets and IDs and money or whatever. Sanji was last to get out of the car, and he lit a cigarette by the time he was standing up straight. 

 

Before they were barely through the front door—Sanji smoked his cigarette in the minute and a half it took to get there—Luffy was swept into a spinning hug that took him right off his feet. 

 

Immediately, Luffy was laughing as a very tall, lanky man wrapped his arms around Luffy, shouting with a sandpapery voice, “School Boy! You came! I waited for you!” He set him down, and Luffy wobbled a little. “And you brought friends!” 

 

Zoro usually didn't notice clothes, but it was kind of impossible to miss this guy's outfit.He was wearing this sparkly purple blazer with matching pants that fit him more like a second skin than actual clothing. He had tons of these weird, fancy-looking embellishments laced and hanging all over him, too. 

 

The sharp stiletto heels this guy was wearing made him tower over Zoro.

 

“Yeah, they all live with me,” Luffy said with a proudness that made Zoro feel like Luffy had fathered them all.  

 

“Did they dress you, too?” guy with makeup and a bowl cut asked. 

 

“Yeah!” Luffy spread his arms, and bowl cut whistled above the loud music. 

 

“I see they couldn’t budge you on the sandals, though.” 

 

“Hell no!” Luffy grinned, and the guy started cracking up, and Luffy turned to the rest of them. “Guys, this is my friend, Bon Clay. He’s hosting the show tonight.” 

 

Zoro and Nami and Sanji and Usopp sort of stared for a second, unprepared for this. 

 

“School Boy, your friends seem kind of quiet,” Bon Clay pointed out, laughing at the expressions on their faces, a hand on his hip, looking down his thin nose at them. He was a little freakishly tall. His blush and his lipstick were intense.  

 

“They're just _really_ excited. They've never been to a drag show before,” Luffy explained with enthusiasm. 

 

“That one has,” Bon Clay pointed right at Sanji, whose mouth fell open a little, his eyes narrowing. “I recognize him. Forgot his name.” 

 

Luffy laughed, and Zoro did too, for that matter, from the look on Sanji’s face, and before Zoro could jump on this opportunity to heckle the fuck out of him, Bon Clay invited them to the bar for a few rounds, and Zoro sure as hell wasn’t going to miss out on that. 

 

Bon Clay bought the entire group three rounds of shots in fifteen minutes, and Zoro didn’t know Luffy's friend very well, but he liked him well enough after he said that anything they wanted, they could put on his tab.

 

Zoro and Nami had glanced at each other when he said that. 

 

“These guys can drink a lot!” Luffy had laughed, like he was warning him, which was fair, and Bon Clay had given them a thumbs-up. 

 

“Drink as much as you can! I’m good friends with the owner of this place! You all are honored guests here.” 

 

Okay. This Bon Clay character was a pretty alright guy. 

 

The atmosphere of the place wasn’t… awful. Well, it was terrible, but it could be worse. The bar was almost more like a club. Lots of neon lights. There was a large dance floor, and there were actually two bars—one outside on the big patio, and the one Zoro was currently sitting at, and the place was pretty packed, and everyone was… having a great time. 

 

“Shit, what time is it?” Bon Clay suddenly asked, and Luffy lost his phone, so he didn’t know, and it was Nami who informed him of the time, to which he replied, “Fuck. I have to go, the show is starting in ten minutes and this asshole has my heels that I need and if that son of a bitch thinks she can wear them all night—listen, friends! Enjoy the show! I’ll be back for you!” 

 

And like a tornado—or maybe there was just a lot of twirling involved—Bon Clay was off, rushing to find whoever had his shoes. Because the ones he already had on weren’t… the right ones. Apparently. Zoro was pretty sure that’s what’d just happened. 

 

It didn’t take long for Nami to order another drink for herself and Usopp and yank him onto the dance floor—Luffy followed close behind them—and Sanji disappeared too, which left Zoro alone at the bar, which was totally fine by him. He wasn’t much of a dancer, and this wasn’t necessarily his scene, but he could sit back and drink free drinks and watch people dressed in mainly tight clothes and glitter dance and laugh together without complaining about it. 

 

The show started a little late, but Bon Clay ran onto the stage, miles above everyone else in his giant platform heels, and he gained the full attention and support of the entire room immediately. Already, there was cheering and clapping, and Bon Clay laughed and made his introductions between professions of love for the crowd and his friends. 

 

He was a pretty decent host, really. It felt like he was some sort of leader. It was weird. 

 

When the show itself started, Zoro ordered himself another drink and sat back in his barstool, watching with mild interest. 

 

At first, he assumed the whole thing was stupid. Really intense lip-syncing, what the hell? It was stupid, and decently weird. Were they even singing at all, or just moving their mouths? But—it was funny, he couldn’t help it—the more he watched, the more he found himself smiling.

 

Zoro scanned the dance floor, picking out his roommates easy enough with Usopp’s giant afro-ponytail. Usopp and Luffy were cheering and grabbing and shaking each other by the shoulders and elbows, extremely impressed and pointing and jumping up and down and bending over backwards when they saw a particularly… energetic dance move on stage. The people around them were behaving no differently, really. 

 

And beside them, Zoro saw Nami next to Sanji, who’d apparently reappeared from whatever shadowy corner he’d gone to hide in. They were backlit by blue and yellow rotating stage lights. Nami had a drink in one hand and the other on Sanji’s shoulder, pulling him down a little. He stood with his arms crossed over his chest and she on the balls of her feet. She was saying something in his ear, her face hidden by his hair a bit. 

 

And then he’d straightened up, and he was laughing, Zoro could see Sanji’s grinning face and his shoulders shaking a little, and he leaned down again, hands cupped around his mouth and her ear, and he said something that made her smile. 

 

Zoro finished his drink and ordered another. He went back to watching the show. 

 

Bon Clay made it back to the bar before his roommates did. 

 

“Where are your friends, Green-haired Boy?” Bon Clay asked casually, ordering a cocktail, crossing one leg over the other as he sat next to Zoro. 

 

“My name is Zoro,” he corrected him. 

 

Bon Clay snorted. “Sure it is, Green-haired Boy. And my name’s Bon Clay. Anyway, why aren’t you dancing and getting all sweaty with everyone else?” 

 

“My name _really is_ Zoro.” 

 

“Would you rather me call you Chia Pet?” 

 

“ _No_.” 

 

“So shut up about it! My question still stands.” 

 

Zoro shifted in his seat, looking out at the crowd of people coating the dance floor. “I’m not much of a dancer.” 

 

“Too bad. Well, we can’t all be good at everything,” Bon Clay said with a shrug, sipping his cocktail through two skinny straws. 

 

“Why do you call Luffy ‘School Boy’?” Zoro asked suddenly, looking over at Bon Clay, who looked right back at him. He was wearing a lot of makeup. “You know he isn’t a student, right?” 

 

Bon Clay laughed with his crass voice that didn’t go with his makeup or his outfit at all, but he seemed to embrace it all the same. “I’ve known him since he was a teenager. Back when I met him, he’d just dropped out of high school. So I called him School Boy after I found that out. He… Anyway, I wasn’t planning on making friends with some scrawny little baby-faced teenage kid, but here we are, years later.” 

 

Zoro studied Bon Clay for a second, taking in what he’d just said. This oddball, who was definitely older—although Zoro literally couldn’t tell _how_ old he was, he couldn’t even guess—had known Luffy longer than all of them had. 

 

“You two don’t seem like you’d have much in common,” Zoro said, wondering for a split second if maybe that was too blunt. 

 

Bon Clay raised his eyebrows and smiled around his straws just a little, and he looked back at the dancers up on the stage who danced and posed and lip-synced with all their might. 

 

“We have more in common than you would think,” Bon Clay said, and he took several sips through his neon straws. 

 

Zoro wasn’t sure what Bon Clay meant by that, but rather than press the matter, he asked, “So how’d you meet him?” 

 

“Work, I guess,” Bon Clay said, stirring the ice in his drink. “I was a different person when I first met him. I wasn’t Bon Clay. But School Boy helped me out, and he was with me through a lot of important things.” Bon Clay grinned openly at the stage and the performers. “He taught me one of the most important life lessons there is.”

 

“And what was that?” 

 

Bon Clay looked back at Zoro, eyes sweeping over his face. “You look like a pretty miserable guy, Green-haired Boy, so I’ll tell you.”

 

Zoro's jaw set. This guy may be Luffy's good friend from however-many years ago, but he sure as hell didn't know jack shit about Zoro.

 

“School Boy taught me how important it is to let yourself be happy. That it’s okay to do what you love and to be happy. And don’t get me wrong—School Boy isn’t the most articulate of people, but he teaches his lessons all the same.” 

 

Zoro snorted. 

 

“You see those beautiful people up on that stage?” Bon Clay asked, grabbing Zoro’s jaw and turning it towards the stage, and Zoro shoved his hand away but looked all the same. 

 

“It’s hard _not_ to see them,” Zoro pointed out. 

 

“They have it figured out more than you do, Green-haired Boy.” 

 

Zoro scowled at Bon Clay. He was getting fucking tired of this shit. 

 

“What are you so _stressed_ about?” Bon Clay prompted, seeing the look on Zoro’s face. 

 

Zoro paused. He held his breath for a few seconds. And then he deflated a little and took a long drink of his beer before he finally said, “A lot of things.” 

 

“If you died tomorrow, would you be satisfied?” 

 

Zoro almost wanted to laugh. “No.” 

 

He didn’t know why he admitted it. He didn’t even know this weirdo. But maybe that was why.

 

“Well,” Bon Clay said, standing up. “Figure that out. I have a show to host—watch closely! These people know what it’s about! It’s free to be happy, Green-haired Boy. Try it out.” 

 

And Bon Clay was gone and Zoro was alone again. 

 

He turned his eyes back on the stage, because he’d lost sight of everyone else again, and watching the performers up there stomping around in impossible-looking heels and twirling and throwing themselves to the ground, looking like they really fucking were singing the song, they were so on point—it was… something. 

 

Zoro wanted to give absolutely no weight to the words of advice that tall-ass nut-job Bon Clay had left him with—but, shit.He was feeling it, just a little.  

 

So, whatever, Zoro was miserable—but he had a plan. It was turning out to be a very difficult plan, and he wasn’t really doing as well as he’d hoped he would when he’d mapped out his life path years ago, but, it was still a solid plan.  

 

It was better to put in the shitty years to come out ahead eventually, so at least he'd have something to show for it all.

 

He looked at the stage.Looked at Bon Clay.

 

Why didn't any of them seem to share that sentiment?

 

Zoro considered his beer and all the things that were most important to him in life. He took a long drink. 

 

He slid from his barstool, beer still in hand, and he went to go find his roommates.

 

Bon Clay was on stage, announcing finalists or maybe even winners, Zoro didn’t even know—but everyone was on the dance floor, crowded together in a confined, sweaty space, fucking pushing on him, but he was bigger than most of them, and he knew he’d find everyone around there somewhere. 

 

It didn’t take long. 

 

“Zoro!” Luffy shouted suddenly, and Nami and Usopp were there too, standing on the tips of their toes, hands on each other’s shoulders for balance, paying close attention to the outcome of whatever Bon Clay was saying. 

 

“Hey,” Zoro said, and before he could say anything else, Luffy hopped a bit and slung an arm around Zoro’s shoulder. 

 

“Bon Clay’s going to say the winners! You’re just in time,” Luffy said, and he threw his other arm around Nami, standing as tall as he could with her, trying to see over the crowd, and Zoro actually hunched over a little so Luffy could use him as a proper support rather than hanging on his neck. 

 

When Bon Clay said some name that sounded like ice cream for strippers, the people around them went nuts, and Luffy and Nami and Usopp were all equally emotionally involved at this point, and they exploded right along with the crowd, and Zoro was lost, but he drank his beer to the winner anyway. 

 

Music started again, blasting out at a familiar tempo, and like some kind of weird glitter-based magic, everyone around them started dancing. Zoro untangled himself from Luffy’s grip, and he turned, looking to escape for at least a minute. He was willing to try the whole fuck-it-enjoy-yourself thing, but this was a bit much. 

 

Before he could slip away, he felt a hand curl around the crook of his arm, and he looked down. 

 

“Where are you going?” Nami shouted up at him over the music. 

 

“Somewhere I can breathe!” he shouted back, using his beer to gesture at everyone around him. 

 

“Take me with you!” Nami replied, although she was the one who led him towards the back patio. Once they were outside and the cold air was hitting them like a fucking blessing, Nami pointed towards the back wall. “There’s another bar over there. So. Let’s do some shots.” 

 

“Lead the way,” Zoro said, feeling a wave of unexpected relief. 

 

Nami ordered them both shots of Patrón because they were drinking on someone else’s tab tonight, and why not treat themselves, she’d said, because they worked hard and they deserved it, and Zoro kind of agreed a little. He certainly didn’t feel guilty. He and Nami had that in common. He liked that about her. 

 

She ordered them a couple Long Islands as well, and they stood by the bar and drank and Zoro actually laughed a few times because Nami was actually kind of funny when she wanted to be. 

 

“Aren’t you driving Usopp’s car home?” Zoro asked. 

 

“Nah. He’s driving home tonight. I made him stop drinking earlier. I always drive his stupid car home. You know—you could drive it home one night. Like. Contribute.” Nami smiled at him from behind her cocktail. "Well. He probably wouldn't let you either way."

 

“Probably not. He loves that piece of shit. And I can’t really drive a stick.” 

 

“Weren't you a valet?How is that even possible?”

 

“That question wasn't on the application.”

 

She rolled her eyes. “Literally none of you idiots can drive a manual. What the hell! What if something happens, and Usopp and I are rendered incapable of driving for whatever reason, and you had to drive his car to save all of our lives—what _then_ , Zoro?” 

 

“We… would all die?” Zoro raised his eyebrows slightly.“Or at least, we'd stall a lot.”

 

Nami snorted. “You’re so useless. At least Usopp fixes shit. And Sanji cooks. And Chopper is a doctor.”  

 

“What about Luffy?” 

 

“I dunno, he has all those DVDs,” Nami pointed out. 

 

Zoro considered the new shots being placed in front of them. “Five hundred alien documentaries—that’s being useful?” 

 

“Okay, you’re both worthless, whatever.” 

 

Nami held up her shot glass and Zoro clinked his against hers. 

 

“Fair,” he said with a smile, and fuck, relaxing a little wasn’t so bad all the time, maybe. They downed their shots and returned to their Long Islands.

 

Still smiling, Zoro brought his drink that’d been poured with an incredibly friendly and heavy hand to his lips.The bartender was being _very nice_ to him and not Nami so much, which was actually almost a little surreal on top of being entertaining as hell. He spun on the barstool and thoughtlessly scanned the people standing around outside under the strung christmas lights that hung over the patio in cross-sections, and he nearly choked on his drink. He swallowed hard and coughed. 

 

Because there was fucking Sanji, Zoro knew that blond mop of hair anywhere, and the stupid asshole was leaned up against one of the stretches of wooden fence that encircled the back patio, way off to the side, and he was talking to some _guy_ , and he wasn’t yelling or starting a fight or anything—he was… Zoro laughed a little. 

 

“What’re you laughing at? You never laugh this much, I feel very funny tonight,” Nami said as she spun her stool around and followed his eyes. She paused. 

 

She knew the look on Sanji’s face just as well as Zoro did. They both easily recognized the way he was looking at this guy, this guy who was obviously a guy and not a man dressed in woman’s clothing—some skinny brunette fuck in a flannel shirt, a _flannel shirt_ , who was stirring his drink with his straw and laughing at whatever Sanji was saying around his cigarette. With that stupid fucking smile on his face. 

 

“Do you want to go back inside?” Nami asked. 

 

Zoro raised his eyebrows and looked down at her. “You think I’m surprised?” 

 

For the first time Zoro had ever witnessed, Nami didn’t seem to know what to say. 

 

“He trips over himself every time he sees a pretty girl. He sleeps with literally anyone. He loves anyone who _looks_ at him. So this doesn’t really surprise me.” Zoro took another long drink and cleared his throat, turning slowly towards the bar again. 

 

Nami spun her barstool along with him, and they ordered refills. 

 

Zoro wasn’t normally this… open, and he knew that was why Nami was being quiet, but he was a little drunk. And. And he didn’t care. 

 

He took a deep breath.

 

Nami looked at him, and she almost looked worried, which was a little funny. 

 

“What?” she asked. 

 

"Nothing," he said, rubbing his mouth. "Just—the whole thing is pretty funny. And that guy, Luffy's friend, that Bon Clay guy, made me feel like... I don't know. Maybe I need to lighten the fuck up." 

 

Nami smiled at him. 

 

“Let’s go find Luffy and your girlfriend,” Zoro said, standing up and stretching a little, almost spilling his drink in the process. 

 

“Ideally he kept an eye on Luffy and didn’t lose him already,” Nami said, and Zoro snorted because losing Luffy was absolutely a possibility. 

 

When they found the both of them, Nami was proud of Usopp for being so sober _and_ for hanging onto Luffy for so long. Usopp was pretty proud of himself, also, which was fair, because that was a tough task. 

 

They stayed another hour or two, Zoro didn’t know, but he kept drinking, and Nami actually kept pace with him all night, hanging around him, sometimes going to get the both of them refills when they reached the bottoms of their high ball glasses without saying anything about it, and Zoro thought briefly to himself at one point that Nami was a good friend to have. 

 

When the collective decided it was time to go home and pass out—primarily led by Usopp, who had to get up in a few hours to go work at his coffee place—it was Nami who announced she’d go find Sanji. Zoro hadn’t seen that dumb asshole for the rest of the night, which was absolutely fine by him. 

 

Although, when Nami returned, she was alone. She shrugged, unable to locate that fucking idiot—Zoro assumed she’d gone to the back patio, because where else would Sanji be, if not inside with the rest of them—and she pulled out her phone. 

 

Luffy went to find Bon Clay to say goodbye, and Usopp followed him because that was the smart thing to do in this situation.

 

“It’s too loud in here to call him—I’m going out front,” Nami shouted up at Zoro, and he followed her outside. 

 

They actually found Sanji standing outside the front of the bar, leaned up against the brick wall, smoking a cigarette and typing something into his phone. 

 

“Sanji, we were looking for you!” Nami said, like she was scolding him, and he immediately looked up at the sound of her approaching voice. 

 

“Were you? Fuck, sorry—I just came out here to get away for a minute. You know. Breathe.” 

 

Funny he said that with smoke in his lungs. Funny he said that at all. 

 

Sanji turned his head to exhale a fat cloud away from Nami’s face, and his expression was all apologies, and she gave him a hard time, but she smiled after a minute. Sanji never even looked at Zoro, his eyes glued to her. 

 

His hair was kind of a mess, and the bottom button of his shirt was undone. He took a long drag of his cigarette, burning away what was left while Nami sent Usopp a text to inform him that they’d found their dumbass roommate. 

 

As the group walked back to Usopp’s station wagon, dragging their heels and slumping their shoulders, Sanji hung back a little, walking next to Zoro. 

 

“Did you have a good time tonight, fuck face?” he asked casually, hands in his pockets as they wavered down the sidewalk. 

 

“Could’ve been worse,” Zoro said, remembering the conversations and the drinks he’d had. 

 

“That bartender outside on the patio looked like he enjoyed serving you,” Sanji said, his eyes on Usopp and Nami and Luffy several feet in front of them. Luffy and Nami were hanging onto each of Usopp’s arms, wobbling and pulling him in opposite directions, and he was doing his best to muscle their weight, but fuck, Luffy and Nami were almost as big as he was, and they couldn’t weigh much less. 

 

Zoro snorted at Sanji’s comment despite himself, and Sanji looked over at him for a few seconds and smiled a little. 

 

It wasn’t until they got to Usopp’s car that Zoro even really thought about what Sanji had just said to him. 

 

On the ride home, Luffy squeezed in the front seat with Nami and Usopp, sitting right in front of the gearshift and taking control of the radio. Zoro didn’t care what they listened to—anything was refreshing after listening to the standard deafening club beat for the past couple hours. 

 

Zoro glanced over at Sanji only once. He was leaned up against the window, chewing away on the corner of his bottom lip, his eyes unfocused and cast down towards his own hands threaded together in his lap. 

 

 

 

* * *

 

“Chopper!” 

 

Nami had originally chalked Chopper’s name up to the odd coincidence that every tenant in that boarding house had a weird name. But apparently, it was his last name. He didn’t have a strange first name at all, so she wondered why he didn’t just go by that. But, to be honest, Chopper suited him better than Tony did. 

 

She knocked on his door even harder. 

 

“Chopper, open up!” 

 

Just as she was about to kick down the fricking door, it flew open, and Chopper was looking at her like he was ready for her to tell him the house was on fire, or that he was late for a class, or something equally horrifying. Well, to Chopper, her news would most likely be on par with all that. 

 

Nami stepped into his room without being expressly invited, and Zoro and Usopp slipped in behind her. She’d brought reinforcements for this. 

 

“Chopper,” she began, smiling at him, her fingers threading together behind her back, “I just wanted to let you know—“

 

“Know what?” Chopper interrupted, apprehensive, like he was on guard already, standing in his own bedroom doorway. 

 

“We’re having a party,” Nami finished, rocking forward and back on her heels a little. Usopp leaned against Chopper’s desk and Zoro sat on Chopper’s bed. 

 

“A party?”

 

“Yep, that’s what I said.” 

 

“Here? When?” 

 

Usopp cleared his throat, looking around Chopper’s room, which was jam-packed with stuffed bookshelves and unpacked boxes. “About an hour, maybe,” he said. 

 

“Are you serious? Why are we having a party? Why didn’t anyone tell me until now?” 

 

“We decided to have it on a whim,” Nami explained. “It’s a Halloween party! We figured it’d be better to just have our own party instead of trying to find the right one.” 

 

“Okay, well, count me out, because—“

 

“Nah, you’re coming,” Zoro said from Chopper’s bed, hands resting on the mattress. Chopper looked positively affronted. Zoro was unfazed. 

 

“But today isn’t even Halloween. Halloween’s on Wednesday.” 

 

“Well, yeah,” Nami said, drifting towards Chopper’s closet, “but it’s the weekend before Halloween, so really, it’s the same thing. Today is Halloween in all reality.” 

 

“I have a test on Wednesday…” Chopper said, mostly to himself, by the look of it, his eyes and voice trailing towards the floor. 

 

“All the more reason to have a party here, tonight!” Nami said, trying to be encouraging. 

 

“I can’t, Nami, you guys, I have to stay focused—“ 

 

“If you don’t hang out with us,” Zoro said, his voice lazy and deep like it almost always was, “then Usopp here will take the door off your room.” 

 

“I have the technology,” Usopp promised. 

 

Chopper stared at them, looking absolutely defeated, and god, it was a little sad, yeah, but it was also _so rewarding_. Nami was very confident that Chopper would thank them for being such good friends some day.

 

“And you have to wear a costume,” she added. 

 

“I don’t _have_ a costume,” Chopper said just as Nami pulled open the door to his closet and dug around a little. It took her a matter of a few seconds to produce a lab coat. Perfect. 

 

“I knew you’d have one of these. Here,” she said, walking over to Chopper and more or less forcing him to put it on. “There! Look, you’re a doctor now. I mean, yes, you’re already a doctor, but now you really _look_ like a doctor.”

 

“I’m not a doctor.” 

 

“I bet you have a stethoscope in here somewhere, don’t you,” Usopp said, suddenly looking around, twisting to survey the desk he was still leaning against, picking up random loose papers like he’d find medical equipment hiding under them. 

 

“I do. And it’s in the bottom drawer, in its case thingy, and I—you guys—it’s really nice that you’re including me, but I’m serious, I should really study. And I have a paper to write. A really, really long paper.” Chopper gave them what looked like the most resolute expression he could manage, and he started to shrug off his lab coat. 

 

It was in that moment that Luffy popped in, leaning in Chopper’s doorway on his way to the stairwell. Or the kitchen. Kitchen made more sense. 

 

“Hey, Chopper!” Luffy said, slicing through the atmosphere that was blanketing the bedroom. 

 

Chopper turned and looked at Luffy, pausing mid coat removal. 

 

“Shut up and celebrate Halloween with your friends!” 

 

Chopper frowned at Luffy, and then, in a small display of relinquishing the metaphorical wheel, he sighed and pulled the lab coat back onto his shoulders. Luffy grinned, and Nami could see Chopper smiling back, just a little, as Usopp slung the stethoscope around his neck and patted him on the back so hard that he stumbled forward. 

 

“Oh! Also, Usopp! You have paints, right?” Luffy said, his mind derailing to a different track entirely. 

 

Nami didn’t know why Usopp would have paints. But. 

 

“Yeah?” Usopp paused, being cautious, which was wise. “Why?” 

 

“Are they paints that can go on your skin?” 

 

Usopp paused again for a completely different reason. “Uh… yes. Well, probably, yes.” 

 

“Will you do me a favor?” 

 

Nami watched Usopp narrow his eyes just a little as he answered, “Probably not.” 

 

“I need help with my Halloween costume.” 

 

Nami left Chopper in the hands of her roommates and went upstairs to prepare her own costume. She stood in the middle of her room, looking around with her hands on her hips. And then, making a quick decision, she yanked the sheets off her bed and shimmied out of her clothes, wrapping said bedsheets around herself and tying them in knots in a few choice locations. There. Perfect. 

 

When she walked across the hall and into Usopp’s room, never breaking her stride as she opened the door and entered, she came upon Zoro and Chopper sitting on Usopp’s bed with Usopp himself sitting on the floor in front of Luffy, both of them with their legs crossed, and Usopp was laughing so hard that he was actually almost crying. 

 

He had a large paintbrush in hand, and he was painting Luffy’s face green, just straight bright traffic light green, and Zoro was trying not to snort into the tallboy he’d grabbed from somewhere, and Chopper was holding his own face, attempting to muffle his giggling. 

 

Luffy turned to look at Nami, his grin looking extra white in contrast against the green, and Nami put a hand over her mouth. 

 

“I look great, right?” Luffy asked her, his bangs and all the hair around his ears pulled up into a little ponytail that bounced on the top of his head. 

 

“Uhm,” Nami said, trying to keep a straight face, “Yeah. You look. Great—what are you?” 

 

“I’m an alien,” Luffy said, like it was fucking obvious. 

 

“He wanted this,” Usopp said, calming down a little, laughter still speckling his speech, and he grabbed Luffy’s chin and turned his head back to face him again. “Hold still, I’m not done.” 

 

Luffy contained himself as much as he could handle, by the look of it, and closed his eyes and curled his lips inwards, probably like Usopp had instructed him to before Nami arrived to witness this ridiculous scene, and she stood there and watched as Usopp dragged his big paintbrush straight down Luffy’s face and immediately started cracking up, like he was totally losing it, all over again. 

 

“Are we gonna do your neck and arms, too?” Usopp asked, pushing Luffy’s hair back more to fill in green along his hairline. He clearly didn’t really care too much if he got paint in Luffy’s messy black perma-bedhead. 

 

“Oh, definitely,” Luffy answered, tilting his head back. 

 

“Good.” Usopp bit his tongue while he tried to stay serious and steady enough to get all the spots under Luffy’s chin. 

“And what’re you supposed to be?” Zoro asked Nami from his spot on Usopp’s bed in between sips of his beer. 

 

“Um,” Nami looked down at her bed sheet ensemble. “I’m a Greek goddess.” 

 

Usopp snorted. “You look homeless.” 

 

Nami held her arms out a little. “A sexy ghost?” 

 

“I might buy that,” he said, moving onto Luffy’s left arm. They were doing a decent job of not making a huge mess. Usopp apparently had the foresight to lay down newspaper to protect the shitty hardwood flooring. Because Luffy clearly didn’t think of it. 

 

“Sexy ghost it is, then,” she said, squeezing between Zoro and Chopper on Usopp’s bed. 

 

“I might buy that if I was piss drunk and going blind,” Zoro said, and Nami punched him on the shoulder, and he smiled just a bit. 

 

“Aren’t you going to put on a costume? People will be here in, like. Two seconds,” she asked him, fiddling with the knots in her bed sheets. 

 

“I _am_ in my costume.” 

 

Nami and Chopper both looked at what Zoro was wearing. And he was wearing what he wore five days out of the week—a white sleeveless undershirt and fucking sweatpants. 

 

“God, you’re so lame,” Nami sighed. “I’m not even going to ask who you’re supposed to be because it’s going to be so stupid, I know it.” 

 

Zoro smiled again and took another drink of his beer. 

 

“Where’s Sanji?” Chopper asked, pulling his legs up onto Usopp’s mattress. He’d put on more respectable-looking trousers and almost really did look like an actual child doctor. Shit, Chopper was so cute, fuck. 

 

“Work, I think,” Zoro said, leaning back a little. 

 

“Did anyone tell him we’re having a party?” 

 

Chopper had a very valid question, and when Nami saw Zoro pause mid-drink, and Usopp halt mid-brushstroke, and Luffy freeze mid-squirm, she knew the answer. 

 

“Whoops,” she said quietly, and then, after a quick thought, she shrugged. “He’ll find out when he gets home. This will just be… Sanji’s surprise Halloween party that we’re throwing for him.” 

 

“I like it,” Zoro said, surprisingly supportive for once. 

 

“Me too,” Luffy said, grinning at her in all-green, and Nami finally laughed at his stupid face. 

 

“Okay,” Usopp cut in, and he put his paintbrush down on the newspaper. “I’m done. You’re an alien.” 

 

Luffy jumped up and rushed to bathroom where there was a full-size mirror hanging on the door, and Nami could hear him shouting about how incredible he looked from down the hall. 

 

He reappeared seconds later, hanging in the doorframe of Usopp’s bedroom, and Nami saw Usopp start to open his mouth and attempt to stop Luffy from putting his freshly green hands on the white wood of the frame, but it was too late. 

 

“I look so _good_ , Usopp, thank you,” Luffy said, an image of jubilance. 

 

Usopp forced a smile and nodded. “You’re welcome.” 

 

“Alright, okay,” Luffy said, pulling out the little ponytail on top of his head, “I think some of my friends are about to be here in a minute. So. Should we get alcohol? Do we have alcohol? Should I go get some more? I’m gonna—here, I’m going to run to the store and buy more and you guys get everything ready and I’ll meet you back here.” 

 

Before any of them could protest or respond in any way whatsoever, Luffy was off, and they listened to him bound down the stairs and slam the front door shut on his way out. 

 

It was obvious that the four silent tenants sitting in that room were all unanimously imagining a green Luffy barreling down the streets on his Vespa and perusing the liquor aisles of a grocery store. 

 

“So what’re you going to be, Usopp?” Nami asked, breaking the few seconds of silence that’d passed between them all. 

 

“Oh—heh, I actually put thought into this. Gimme a minute,” Usopp said, hauling himself to his feet, and he slowly pulled the thick black ponytail holder from his hair on his way to his desk, scrunching his eyes shut as he freed all his curls, and he slid his hairband onto his wrist as he reached upwards to muss up his hair with one hand, pulling open a desk drawer and removing a hair pick from it with the other, and he put the pick between his teeth so he could fully dedicate both hands to teasing and working the curly mess on his head. Without a word, he walked right out of the room, pick still in his mouth. 

 

Nami and Chopper and Zoro all looked at each other, sharing a mutual loss for explanations. 

 

Usopp returned not five minutes later, his hair fluffed into a slightly messy afro, and he had on one of Sanji’s collared button-up shirts, and he was rolling up one of the sleeves. 

 

Nami and Chopper and Zoro waited for their due explanation. 

 

Usopp had his old shirt that he’d been wearing minutes ago slung over the crook of his arm, and he dropped it thoughtlessly on the bedroom floor, and he rolled up the other sleeve of Sanji’s pale blue shirt—Nami knew it was Sanji’s because she’d seen him wear it, and because Usopp didn’t own anything like that, and it was very slightly too tight on him, but—

 

“Alright,” Usopp said as he bent over and picked up his paintbrush and palate, which had a lot of green on it now. “Check it out.” He held up the brush and gave them the cheesiest of grins. “I’m Bob Ross.” 

 

Nami and Zoro both actually laughed, like stupid, unwilling, snorting laughter that they almost felt guilty about. 

 

“Who’s Bob Ross?” Chopper asked, still totally lost. 

 

“Happy trees,” Zoro said, and honestly, that was a better explanation than Nami could’ve given. 

 

“I… see.” Maybe Bob Ross was before Chopper’s time. 

 

“He was a painter on television way back in the day,” Usopp explained. “He was a great man.” 

 

“Is that why you’ve been growing out that heinous beard?” Nami asked. 

 

“Yes.” 

 

“So you’re getting rid of it after Halloween,” she continued. 

 

“Absolutely.” 

 

“Thank god,” she said, relieved. 

 

Before Usopp could get properly offended by her disapproval of his gross beard, there was a loud knock on their front door. 

 

The four of them shared the same look: Here we go. 

 

It took less than an hour for their giant common area downstairs to be totally filled with costumed bodies. 

 

Luffy knew a lot of people. 

 

A fresh drink in her hand, Nami sat with Usopp on the winding stairs next to the kitchen, looking out over the swelling sea of people in their home. They’d already lost track of Luffy, but across the room, they could see Zoro introducing Chopper to several pretty girls, and Zoro and Nami and Usopp were all laughing at Chopper’s heated face and general floundering. 

 

God, it was so nice to see Zoro in a good fucking mood for once. He was _totally likable_ when he wasn’t busy being angry and miserable. 

 

When people had first started showing up, Nami had felt a bit… overwhelmed. And she could tell her roommates shared her sudden apprehension. People were filing through her door in a steady stream, and one person had brought very large speakers, and his friends were carrying in electronic turntables and a synthesizer, and he was saying he was a DJ, which, everyone and their brothers were DJs these days, so Nami wasn’t impressed, but the music had started and god, there were so many people so suddenly. 

 

But then Luffy had gotten back with multiple bags filled with clinking glass bottles and Nami and Zoro and Usopp had all been visibly relieved. Chopper didn’t look any better. But time would change that. 

 

Luffy seemed to know most of the people there, or at least half of the people there, which was saying a lot. He hadn’t wasted any time in opening several of the bottles he’d brought home, and he’d also purchased, like, two hundred plastic solo cups, which was shockingly thoughtful of him, Nami was impressed, and Luffy made sure they all had full drinks in their hands before he started introducing them to a huge wave of people. Nami had forgotten just about everyone’s name almost immediately. 

 

Not on purpose. Just. There were _a lot_ of people. 

 

Nami took a long drink of her vodka cocktail that she’d thrown together—there was pineapple juice and mango juice in the fridge, so she mixed together some pretty tasty drinks for Chopper and Usopp and herself. She glanced at Usopp’s drink. He’d actually been outpacing her, but that wasn’t surprising. He had that whole anxiety thing going on. She knew Usopp well enough at that point. His liquor would catch up to him and he’d slow way down before too long. 

 

She was surprised at how many people had turned up on such short notice. Even Trampstamp Law had shown up with his gloomy face and goofy friends. Luffy had been ecstatic, darting over to him as soon as he walked in the door, pointing to his green face and holding out his green arms—which, his hands weren’t very green anymore, and there were spots where he’d touched his face and rubbed off the paint, and that reminded Nami—

 

“Hey, Usopp,” she said above the music, and he looked over at her. “Why do you have a bunch of paints and all that art stuff?” 

 

“I like to do art,” he responded, and Nami paused. Like. Well, obviously, you freaking dork. 

 

“Are you any good?” 

 

“Eh, kinda. Sometimes. Sometimes I have good days and I’m like, ‘holy shit, Usopp, look at this thing you did.’ But mostly I’m not that great.” 

 

Nami smiled a little. “You make a good Bob Ross. C’mon—let’s go mingle.”

 

She rose to her feet and Usopp stood with her, and she linked her arm around his so as not to lose him like they’d already lost Luffy, and with drinks in hand, they dove in. 

 

There was a lot of dancing, which Nami was a big fan of, and she danced her way around the house with Usopp in tow, and the more they looked around, the more they kept bringing their drinks to their mouths. 

 

Their house was getting fucked up. 

 

Nami saw a hole in the wall. And Usopp pointed out that it looked and kinda smelled like part of their couch had maybe caught fire for a minute? And oh, fuck, Nami spotted a guy hanging on the fridge door, like he had it open, and he was hanging on it, and, goddamn it, Nami and Usopp watched as the door to their fridge came right off, detaching completely from the rest of the appliance. 

 

Nami and Usopp both screamed a little, and they rushed over, and after Nami swatted the guy away, both she and Usopp were able to combine their strength and get the fridge door back on its hinge, and they high-fived so hard at their success that Nami’s hand felt like it was on fire. It stung for a good several minutes. And they went back to drinking. 

 

Eventually, Usopp spotted Zoro and Chopper, and they reunited by the coffee table. Chopper spilled his drink on himself a little as he ducked out of the way when some some drunk stranger tipped their tall standing lamp over. Chopper looked at the lamp on the floor for a moment. And then he looked back up at Nami. 

 

“There’s a lot of people here,” he said, his freckled cheeks and ears totally red, and he was squinting his eyes a little. “I’ve met a lot of people. Where were you guys? Did you—did you see that Law is here? Law is here, I’m going to go find him in a minute because. I have something that I need to talk to him about.” 

 

Chopper swayed on his feet just a little, and Nami and Usopp grinned at him. 

 

“We’re ready to find Law whenever you are, Chopper,” Nami told him, and he looked a little surprised.

 

“Really? Oh. I expected… some kind of fight. For some reason. Okay! Alright, I’m going to find Law, and you guys can come with me? Where’s Luffy? Is he still here?” Chopper was rambling a little and god, Nami took a deep breath, because he was so horribly adorable. 

 

As Chopper was starting to turn in order to lead them on a search to find Law for whatever reason, because Chopper had some important doctor things to discuss with him, apparently, they all stopped because they were very suddenly interrupted. 

 

Sanji, a drink in both hands, stumbled up on them, still dressed in his chef’s uniform from work. 

 

“Oh, hey!” he said, looking a little flustered. And maybe a little drunk? 

 

“Hi, Sanji!” Usopp shouted, looking genuinely excited to see him, and, hah, Usopp was starting to feel it, wasn’t he. 

 

“Hello! Also, I didn’t know we were having a party?” Sanji had a cigarette tucked behind his ear, and he almost spilled one of his drinks as a total stranger clapped him on the shoulder, physically rattling him, complimenting him on his great chef costume. 

 

“Yeah,” Nami said, and Sanji looked back at her. She went on, “It’s a surprise Halloween party for you. Happy Halloween!” 

 

“Aw, this is your party? This is a great party! Happy Halloween, man!” the stranger said in congratulations to Sanji, who ignored him completely. 

 

Sanji stared at Nami with totally exhausted and glassy eyes all for a matter of a second or two before cracking into a smile. “You’re the most thoughtful friend I have,” he said, looking like he might melt, and Nami laughed. What a trooper.

 

Zoro snorted and their stranger-friend slipped back into the flowing current of the crowd and Sanji gave Zoro a once-over. 

 

“What’re you supposed to be?” Sanji asked, sipping one of his two drinks. 

 

“Bruce Lee,” Zoro answered.  

 

“That’s the dumbest… god, I hate you,” Sanji said, wrinkling his nose. 

 

“John McClane in Die Hard?” Zoro asked. 

 

“That’s worse. Bruce Willis is a fuck.” 

 

“Wolverine.” 

 

Sanji rolled his eyes and took several long gulps from one of his solo cups, and Nami leaned on Usopp while she watched the two of them actually not scream at each other. How heartwarming. 

 

“I’m Rocky Balboa in that one scene,” Zoro continued. “I’m, uh… I’m Sigourney Weaver in Alien.” 

 

Sanji actually smiled a little at that. 

 

“I’m Vin Diesel in every role he’s ever had.” 

 

“Stop,” Sanji said, finishing a drink and leaving the empty cup on the coffee table, right next to fifty other empty cups and bottles and cans. “You’re ruining my surprise Halloween party.” 

 

“Are we going to talk to Law or not!” Chopper shouted suddenly, standing on the balls of his feet, trying to gain some ground. 

 

“Why do you want to find that creep?” Sanji asked over the music, and Chopper looked offended. 

 

“What the hell are you talking about! He’s really cool! He’s—he’s so knowledgeable and he has some really interesting opinions about some things, and—“

 

“And you sound like you have a boner for him,” Zoro said, and Chopper dropped his jaw and his drink on the ground. 

 

“I— I definitely _do not_ have an—a —“ Chopper was sputtering as he squatted down to pick up his empty plastic cup, trying to scoop up the melty ice that’d gone everywhere, and he was a straight mess. 

 

“Chopper,” Nami said, patting the top of his head, and he squinted up at her. “Zoro is teasing you. Calm down. We know you guys both like to doctor out together. It’s fine. Just—just leave the cup, Chopper, it’s alright. We’ll clean this shit up tomorrow.” 

 

“Speaking of which,” Sanji began as Chopper stood up, the knees of his doctor-trousers all wet from kneeling on the ground where he’d just spilled his own drink. Sanji took another several gulps from his remaining beverage and looked around the room full of people stumbling and dancing and being general train wrecks from behind his cup. He swallowed and chewed on his bottom lip a bit as he said, “Our house is getting _fucked up._ ” 

 

“I know,” Nami said, grimacing. 

 

“Our landlord’s going to kill us. Our neighbors will hate us.” Usopp had both hands around his little red cup, and he looked absolutely hilarious, standing there and worrying while he was dressed up like Bob Ross. 

 

“He’s not going to kill us.” Zoro snorted, and the group turned their heads towards him. Upon seeing their faces, he went on to inform them that, “The landlord’s in the back yard with Luffy smoking a joint right now. I saw them earlier. He’s been here for about an hour, probably.” 

 

There was a communal pause. And then Nami glanced at the back door that led out to the overgrown backyard with the shitty concrete ‘patio’ and walkway. 

 

“Oh. That’s… I’m going to go find them,” she said, and she didn’t bother with waiting on the rest of them—she pushed past Zoro and started making her way towards the kitchen. 

 

Usopp was quick to follow suit. “I’m going too,” he said, dipping out along with her with zero hesitation. 

 

And it was only a second before they heard Sanji say, “Have fun with Doctor Feelgood,” to Zoro, and he caught up to them before they were lost to the crowd. 

 

Zoro could hang out with Chopper while he and Law got all medical with each other. That was fine. Also a little funny. 

 

Sanji and Nami and Usopp managed to stick together and get through the back yard, and they didn’t even have to search. 

 

“Hey guys!” Luffy shouted, jumping up off the … couch?

 

“Has there always been a couch out here?” Usopp asked as Luffy approached, voicing the exact same thought Nami was having. 

 

“No! Actually, Brook and I brought it over from his house. Like twenty minutes ago. We thought it’d be nice to have out here. Isn’t it awesome? He has a lot of furniture,” Luffy explained. 

 

"You two brought it over?" Sanji asked, and Nami knew he was wondering how the hell a living relic like Brook could hold up one end of a big couch, but Brook seemingly wasn't thinking about that at all.

 

“I have more furniture from every decade than I even know what to do with!” Brook said from the couch, and Zoro was right, their landlord had the fattest joint Nami had ever seen in between his skinny fingers, and she went right over and sat down next to him. 

 

Once she was next to him, she realized that his entire face was painted like a skull. Not like a sugar skull, but like a realistic skeleton; it was incredible, Nami didn’t know how he’d done that with just face paint or makeup or whatever he’d used, and she gaped at him. 

 

He started cracking up, that old cackle she’d heard before, as soon as he noticed her staring.

 

“You look pretty nuts,” Sanji said as he lit a cigarette, taking a seat with Usopp on the concrete ground in front of the red couch. It looked like it was red, anyway, but it was hard to tell with how dark it was outside. Luffy perched on an armrest. 

 

“Ah, thank you! I just put this together last minute.”

 

It was the most incredible last minute bullshit Nami had ever seen. He looked like a walking skeleton in a suit with an afro. It was unbelievable. 

 

“By the way!” Brook said, and Nami looked over at him, and she couldn’t get over how thin he was. And how wide his smile was. “This is a great party!” He held the joint out to her and Nami’s grin almost matched his. 

 

“Thanks, Brook. We just put it together pretty last minute.” Nami winked and Brook laughed and she took the joint and put it between her lips. She glanced down at her feet to see Usopp laughing to himself, shaking his head, and she took a moment to think about how she was on the exact same page as he was right then. 

 

So that was how Nami and Usopp and Sanji ended up smoking weed with their landlord while Luffy paced around, talking to them and gesticulating wildly about aliens and UFO’s and shit that none of them cared about normally, but were actually very entertained by at that particular time. 

 

When the joint and all their drinks were finished, and Usopp was laying flat on his back against the concrete, and Sanji had somehow lost his lighter in the dark, Brook stood and spun the thin cane he’d made part of his costume. Or maybe he always had a cane with him. Nami couldn’t remember.  

 

“Well!” he said, smiling at all of them. Sanji and Usopp and Nami all looked up at him, totally stuck in their seats. “I think it’s time to go enjoy more of this party.” 

 

Luffy was on board, and he made it to the door before Brook did, and they left Nami and Sanji and Usopp alone in the back yard. 

 

Sanji was the first to stand, and he held out his hand for Nami, who absolutely needed it to get out of that couch. He pulled her to her feet, and she stretched, feeling a little spinny, and a lot thirsty, and yeah, she needed to find another drink. She and Sanji looked down at Usopp. 

 

“Get up, we’re going inside,” Sanji commanded, nudging Usopp with the toe of his shoe. 

 

“No, I’m afraid to see the damage,” Usopp groaned, making zero effort to get up. 

 

“We’ll go do some shots,” Nami said, like that’d fix the destruction of their home, and she and Sanji squatted down and grabbed Usopp by each arm, yanking him upwards, forcing him to stand.

 

“I’m already drunk,” Usopp mumbled, rubbing his face once his was upright. “And I’m high. Should I drink more? I guess I probably should. It’s Halloween. And I’m Bob Ross.” 

 

“Yes you are,” Sanji said, pushing on his back, and they steered Usopp inside and towards the kitchen. 

 

Once inside, they squinted against the light, staring out at the downstairs level of their house, momentarily forgetting what they were doing once they saw all the people still dancing and shouting and spilling things everywhere. 

 

“Sanji! Usopp, Nami! Hey!” Chopper said suddenly, rushing up to them, nearly plowing into Usopp. They focused their attention on their youngest roommate, bracing themselves for an emergency, but no, heh, Chopper was just drunk and extremely excited to see them after being separated for half an hour.

 

Zoro approached after Chopper, looking over for a second before turning back to the group. “Dude, that doctor guy, Trampoline or whatever Law, is fucking _weird_.” 

 

“I know!” Sanji shouted, ignoring Chopper’s immediate loud disagreeing. 

 

“ _You’re_ weird!” Chopper yelled at Zoro, one hand balled into a fist and the other clenched around a can of beer that Zoro had probably given him. 

 

“You really are,” Sanji said, agreeing with Chopper. 

 

Zoro smiled a little at both of them. “This coming from the twelve-year-old boy genius and Monsieur Jerks-Off-To-The-Food-Network.” 

 

“Listen,” Nami interrupted, and she pointed between her and Usopp. “We are the only two normal people in this house. The rest of you are all weird. I promise. You’re all weird dorks.” 

 

“Aw!” Sanji looked wounded. “Nami, how could you _say that?_ ” 

 

Nami had every intention of responding, but before she could, Sanji’s attention turned suddenly to a very large guy dressed up like a viking who approached in a flurry and had grabbed Sanji by his shoulders, big palms clapped around them, shaking him. 

 

“Oh my god, it’s you!” the stranger shouted right in Sanji’s face, looking totally ecstatic to have found Nami’s clearly confused roommate. 

 

“Oh my god, it’s me,” Sanji said, his eyes wide, already trying to reclaim his personal bubble, but the guy wouldn’t let go of him. 

 

“You’re Sanji!” big guy said, and the more Nami looked at him, the more she realized he looked… like an ugly version of Sanji, oh shit, he almost had the same blond hair, and his facial hair was like a shittier version of Sanji’s goatee, oh god, this was too funny already. 

 

Sanji’s mouth was hanging open, his eyes wide and eyebrows pursed together. 

 

“I just had to apologize to you, Sanji. I have to apologize, because I fucking hated you, okay, I hated you, but thanks to you, I’m just—you saved me, Sanji. I should have never hated you. I shouldn’t have judged you.” 

 

“I…” Sanji began as he pried himself from this guy’s grip, “have no idea who you are.” 

 

The guy’s face fell a little. “You don’t?” 

 

“No clue.” 

 

“We’ve had classes together for years. We even went to the same high school! I was so pissed when I found out you were a student at Sabaody. Same major, even.” Sanji’s bizarre doppleganger held his arms out while he explained himself. “You were better than me at everything, and you were a fucking asshole about it, and you sound stupid as hell when you talk, but—“ 

 

“But?” Sanji asked, his eyebrows raised and his wording clipped short. 

 

“But thanks to you, I’m not going to fail  Corporate Information Technology. And I need to pass that class.” The guy really did look genuinely grateful. 

 

“What?” Sanji was still at a total loss, by the look on his face. Nami glanced at her other roommates, who were all tuned into the conversation at this point. Surely they’d noticed Sanji being super confused by his ugly viking reflection. 

 

“That test we had? Just recently?The one that was worth, like, a huge chunk of our grade?” 

 

Sanji narrowed his eyes. “Yeah?” 

 

“I was so far behind in that class, I knew I was going to fail—I didn’t even go to that class that day, I didn’t even _take_ that test.” 

 

Sanji curled his lips inwards, waiting for this guy to keep talking. 

 

“You must’ve forgotten to put your name on that test. There had to be some kind of mix-up, because the professor just scribbled my name on the test and took off five points for forgetting.” 

 

Nami put a hand over her mouth for the second time that evening, watching Sanji over her fingers. Still, he said nothing. 

 

“He must not’ve been paying attention. And you know he doesn’t take attendance. So.” 

 

Sanji put a cigarette in his mouth, and Nami could see it in his eyes: the moment he remembered he’d lost his lighter outside. 

 

“What’s your name?” Sanji asked, his voice tight and barely controlled. 

 

“You can call me Duval.” 

 

“Duval… what a stupid fucking name,” Nami heard Sanji say a little quietly, and Duval leaned forward. 

 

“What’d you say?” Duval asked over the music. “Sorry, your accent or whatever that is—“

 

“I said, do you have a lighter?” Sanji said loudly, yanking the cigarette out of his mouth. 

 

“Oh— nah, I don’t smoke.” 

 

Sanji nodded slowly, rolling the cigarette back and forth between his thumb and index finger. “How would the teacher fuck up that hard?” 

 

“I dunno, dude, we kinda look alike.” 

 

Sanji looked like he was about to throw up. “We look nothing alike.” 

 

“We kinda do.” 

 

It was at this point that Zoro burst out laughing, and Nami and Usopp and Chopper all looked over at him, and they were all trying not to laugh, but now Zoro was making it really, _really_ difficult. 

 

“I had to retake that test,” Sanji said slowly.

 

“He _let_ you?!” Duval looked stunned.

 

“I had to argue with that fuckwit for twenty minutes that he'd lost my test before he agreed.He  took off fifteen percent for taking it late.I would’ve had a perfect grade otherwise.” 

 

“I know! You got a perfect grade the first time! Well, you would have, if you would’ve remembered to put your name on it. Heh. Anyway, I wonder whose house this is? It is getting _fucked up_.” Duval was looking around, his nose scrunched up a little. 

 

It was about then that Nami noticed Sanji had put his cigarette back into the pack, and the pack itself was safe in his pocket, and his hands were clenched into very tight fists. 

 

Zoro must’ve seen it at the same time Nami did, or even a little before that, because he suddenly stepped in between Sanji and Duval, and he _threw his arm_ _over Sanji’s shoulders_ like they were best fucking friends, and that alone fucked Sanji up enough that he didn’t throw the sucker punch they all knew was coming. 

 

“Hey, Chef Ramsey, lets, uh, go out front and find a lighter,” Zoro said, and Sanji was fucking _sputtering_. 

 

Zoro steered Sanji away, pushing him in the direction of the front door, and Duval looked a little lost. Nami and Usopp and Chopper went to follow Sanji and Zoro, and Usopp patted Duval on the back a couple times on his way out.

 

After about five steps, Sanji shoved Zoro away from him, and he was about to explode, like openly freak out, but Usopp and Nami filled in the space on either side of him, trying to calm him down, and it didn’t help that they were all laughing openly now, and if Nami hadn’t been hanging on Sanji’s arm, she was pretty sure he would’ve turned right around and smashed Duval’s face in. 

 

When they made it to the front porch, they found Luffy out there with Law, who happened to have a lighter that Sanji could use and maybe Sanji disliked him slightly less after that. Law hadn’t bothered to wear a costume. He also had green paint all over the front of his shirt. Which was funny. 

 

“Guys, I’m glad you’re all out here,” Luffy said, a drink in his left hand, pointing at all of them. “I was thinking about how I look way better when I’m painted, like everyone at the grocery store when I was buying liquor earlier thought I looked _very cool_ , so going on that—I think we should paint the house. It’s our house, you know? It's a little run-down looking. We should paint it.” 

 

What an understatement.

 

“That’s a lot of work,” Usopp said, hands in his pockets. 

 

“Is that my shirt?” Sanji asked suddenly, taking a long drag off his cigarette. 

 

“It is. Also, Luffy, paint is expensive, and I don’t know about you, but I’m really poor.” Usopp crossed his hands over his chest and leaned against the railing that outlined the front porch. And then he seemed to remember the integrity of the house in general and thought better of it, standing up straight again. 

 

“Ah, yeah, there’s that. I did just spend a lot of money on alcohol. Alcohol is expensive, by the way, what the hell!” Luffy said, and they all remembered at the same time that they never did manage to get themselves refills on their drinks before Duval happened. 

 

“I have a solution,” Usopp said, looking at the front door. “I’ll be back in a few minutes. I will meet you all out here. In a few minutes. Someone get more drinks.” 

 

And with that, he went back inside. For whatever reason. 

 

Chopper actually volunteered to get everyone drinks, because it was a pain in the ass to navigate through so may people inside, and this surprised everyone, but maybe Chopper was starting to enjoy the whole hammered drunk thing. Zoro went with him, and Nami and Sanji sat with Luffy and Law. 

 

Law’s friends showed up and ended up pulling him back inside, which Luffy looked a little annoyed over until Usopp reappeared with his arms full of tubes of acrylic paint and a couple paintbrushes and that palate of his. 

 

“We’re going to paint?” Luffy asked, totally distracted, and Usopp spread everything out on the porch. 

 

“Obviously. Well, I am. You're not.” 

 

Zoro and Chopper came back, a few bottles in their arms, and several plastic cups stacked on top of each other. 

 

“It was easier to just bring bottles and cups out here than carrying however-many full drinks,” Chopper explained, sitting down on the concrete porch steps. 

 

“You just brought straight liquor?” Nami asked, squinting in the dark at what they’d brought back. 

 

“I found a two-liter of Coke,” Zoro said, and Nami rolled her eyes. Gross. 

 

They all mixed drinks for themselves—nothing really went well with Coke, but, whatever—and Usopp stood in front of the door. 

 

“You’re going to paint the door?” Chopper asked, his eyebrows raised. “Won’t our landlord be mad?” 

 

“He won’t care,” Sanji said, lighting another cigarette already. 

 

“What color will it be?” Luffy asked, excited over the whole thing. 

 

“It’ll be a few colors,” Usopp said after taking a few long drinks of his very strong cocktail. He made a face, Nami could smell his drink, and she laughed a little. 

 

She didn’t know what he had in mind, but she stood next to him, holding her cell phone up as a light for him while he painted straight onto their front door. Luffy and the rest of their roommates sat on the front porch, watching and drinking and talking. Usopp would pause every few minutes when someone opened the door from inside to leave or come out and smoke a cigarette. 

 

The weather was really nice out, for the end of October. 

 

After maybe twenty or thirty minutes, Usopp stepped back, finished, trying not to get paint on Sanji’s shirt, but god, he was drunk, Nami could see it in his posture. 

 

“Damn, Usopp!” Luffy shouted, jumping to his feet. 

 

Usopp had painted a big lion’s head on their front door. He’d used orange and yellow and white and red and the colors ran together in places, and it looked a little cartoony, but it was cute, with its big spiky mane and goofy smile. It was wonderful.

 

Nami grinned. “Holy shit, Usopp,” she said, putting her elbow up on his shoulder, leaning on him. “Look at this thing you did! I didn’t know you were so talented.” 

 

Usopp laughed. “Talent is a pursued interest. In other words, anything that you’re willing to practice, you can do.” 

 

“Fucking deep,” Sanji said, snorting, sitting on the ground with the rest of them, leaned up against the railing with his ankles crossed. 

 

“Bob Ross said that,” Usopp smiled. 

 

“Are we going to name it?” Luffy asked, getting closer, and he grabbed Nami’s cell phone from her so he could shine the light on the door himself. It really did look pretty cool. Nami snatched her phone back after a few seconds.

 

“What, name the door?” Chopper asked, standing up next to Luffy, looking equally impressed. 

 

“The lion! Or, the house itself! We all live here. We can’t just call it ‘house.’ It’s more than that.” Luffy was grinning, his face still fairly green in spots. “I’ve never been able to live in a big house with all my friends before. It makes sense to name it.” 

 

“What’re we gonna name it?” Chopper seemed immediately supportive of the idea. 

 

“Bear! Polar Bear! Or. Lion.” Luffy rambled off suggestions super-quick. 

 

“No,” Nami said helpfully. 

 

“Tiger! Wolf! Lion.” 

 

“We can’t name our house Lion, Luffy,” Chopper said, looking back at the door. 

 

“Boss Lionel,” Zoro said, and Sanji burst out laughing. Zoro glared at him. 

 

“Squid! Octopus! Chimpanzee!” 

 

“No!”

 

“It looks like a sunflower,” Sanji said, rubbing his eyes. 

 

Luffy put his hands on his hips, joining Chopper in staring down the bright smiling lion on their front door. After a few seconds, he suggested, “The Thousand Sunny.” 

 

There was a lag as everyone suddenly considered this. 

 

"Where'd 'Thousand' come from?" 

 

"I'unno. Sounded cool."

 

Well. There were worse names out there. 

 

Luffy grinned hard at the apparent lack of disapproval. 

 

“Alright,” he said, taking a sip of his drink. “The Thousand Sunny.” 

 

They kept drinking, and eventually they all went inside and danced and shouted and laughed along with everyone else until nearly dawn. Usopp and Chopper went out to the backyard to throw up together, and they both passed out on the red couch outside. Luffy disappeared into his room in the basement at some point, growing abruptly tired out of nowhere. Sanji and Zoro and Nami all kicked out as many people as they could, but settled on letting strangers and friends pass out on their couches and loveseats and the floor in the common area of the first floor. 

 

Sanji eventually reached his limit and trudged up the stairs, his chef’s uniform hanging off him and his hair a frizzy mess, dark circles under his bloodshot eyes. 

 

Nami and Zoro sat together on the concrete stairs of the front porch in front of the big smiling lion, drinking their umpteenth cocktail and watching the sun come up. They both wore jackets and said very little. 

 

“I wonder if our neighbors will complain about the front door,” Nami mused, her elbows on her knees, fingers wrapped around her drink and the ends of her jacket sleeves. 

 

“I think most of our neighbors were here tonight,” Zoro said, looking down the cul-de-sac. 

 

Nami smiled just a little. “Figures.” 

 

After another stretch of silence, Zoro said slowly, “Tonight wasn’t so bad. I mean. Other than… all our shit getting fucked up. And a bunch of strangers passed out on the floor inside.” 

 

“We’ll worry about that later,” Nami sighed, almost wanting to laugh. Her eyes rose to the horizon line, focusing on nothing with Zoro. “It was nice to see you being happy tonight.” 

 

“Thanks, Mom." 

 

“I’m just saying. Normally you don’t come off as being very happy. So it was nice seeing you enjoy yourself for once.” 

 

Zoro took a sip of his dark cocktail and said nothing. 

 

 

* * *

 

It was getting a little hard to suppress his excitement.Today was going to be a really super class. Franky leaned back in his chair, impatiently flipping through pages of a robotics journal that he wasn't really taking in as a dozen or so students rushed around the lab, making last-minute adjustments to their robots.

 

About thirty minutes before his class officially began, he decided it was time for him to change locations.Rising to his feet, he tried to conceal his eagerness as he scribbled big, bold letters on the white board:

 

MID-TERM EVALUATIONS ON THE ROOF.

 

He pressed his lips together, barely containing his smile.He'd been watching everyone tinker away at their projects for the last several weeks, but now it was time for the test-run.Well, the first really official rest run.And it was a gorgeous day outside—really warm for the last day of October.A great day to play with some super robots.

 

“Alright, guys,” he called out, clapping his hands together.“I'm gonna go open up the doors to the roof.I'll see you all up there soon.”

 

“Hey, um, real quick,” Usopp, one of his students, called out to him, waving a hand to get his attention.

 

“What is it?”

 

“Do you have anything smaller than a triple-zero in this?” he asked, holding up a small JIS-type screwdriver.“That's the smallest I've got in my kit, but I'm having a hard time with this one screw...”

 

“Oh, sure, I've got every size you could ever possibly need,” Franky assured, quickly walking over to a cabinet at the far end of the lab.He'd amassed an impressive collection of tools for the department and created drawers and expanding storage to keep it organized to perfection.He proudly yanked out a drawer with over forty micro-sized screwdrivers, all lined up by size and type.  

 

“Wow, I'm impressed,” Usopp said, bringing a hang to his chin as he stared at the collection, wide-eyed.

 

“Yeah, pretty great, right?” Franky grinned at his student's reaction, setting a hand on his hip.“Use whatever you need, just be sure to put it back.”

 

“Will do.Thanks.”

 

Humming to himself, Franky made his way to the stairwell that led to the roof of the science and engineering building, stopping by a Coke machine.  

 

He could hear a lecture from a nearby classroom over the clink of the quarters he was stuffing in the machine slot.After hesitating briefly, he spun on his heel and lingered towards the open classroom door and stood next to it.He winced at the sound of the seal on his bottle breaking as he unscrewed the cap.

 

“... The camel gun was another formidable weapon, which originated in Egypt and was later used in India, Persia and elsewhere.As you can see here, the camel gun was a very literal name for it, as the cannon itself was designed to rest of the back of a camel.”

 

Oh, was a super interesting topic—he inched a little closer, until he could see inside.At the front of the room stood Professor Nico Robin, next to a projection screen.

 

He wondered what the topic of the lecture was—ancient weapons, or warfare, maybe.Wow, he kind of wanted to hear more.

 

“The Persians began to call the camel gun the zamburak, which translates to 'little wasp'—which was actually a quite fitting epithet for how it was viewed on the battlefield by the enemy.Typically, these zamburak were used to fire from a range too far for the enemy to retaliate.Although the damage was seldom critical, it was a tremendous nuisance.”

 

Yeah, he remembered reading a bunch of articles on the zamburak—although he was mostly interested in the various designs and modifications of it.Franky always felt super inspired reading about the evolution of weapons technology.Without these early inventions, things like the gatling gun and the tank would've never been invented.

 

“In a way, the camel was the original tank,” Professor Robin continued, and he widened his eyes in surprise—he sort've felt like she'd read his mind for a second. “In addition to the zamburak, camels were  encased in armor and used to charged into battle.” 

 

Robin clicked over to the next picture of an armored camel, charging into a gruesome battle.

 

“The camels look kind of cute in it, don't you think?” The corner of her lip curved upward, ever so slightly.

 

After listening for a few moments, he realized he'd gotten a little too immersed in the topic—he needed to go open the door to the roof, since class was starting in—yikes, less then twenty minutes now.Taking a swig of the Coke, he took one last look into her classroom.  

 

Professor Robin's eyes met his for a brief moment.

 

Whoops.He'd been spotted.

 

The mid-term evaluations were fantastic.Man, he had some great students—they'd started some projects he was really proud of, and had come up with ideas he'd never even imagined.  

 

One young woman in particular had made a really cool robot that shot projectiles using pressurized air, using only solar energy for power.Totally awe-inspiring.When she'd first pitched it to him, Franky had told her he wasn't sure if it was going to work with the materials and time she had available, but she'd somehow figured out a way.

 

In testing it, they discovered that while it was generating enough energy, its control still needed some work.One of the projectiles she was using—those little toy wooden blocks kids played with, which apparently her family had a ton of at home because she had a lot of younger siblings—accidentally got shot forward a little too far and flew off the edge of the roof.  

 

Franky, along with a couple of students, ran to the edge of the rooftop, searching for it.  

 

“Oh, there it is!” a student yelled, pointing, just as it hit the ground.The block slammed against the cement, rolling harmlessly across the ground.It stopped several feet away from a woman who Franky recognized as one of the faculty.The woman jumped back in alarm, but she hadn't actually been in any danger of being hit. Like, by the time the block got close to her, it was barely tumbling.

 

“Sorry about that!” Franky called out, his booming voice easily carrying across school grounds.The faculty woman looked up at him, although she was too far away for him to read her expression.He waved at her disarmingly.“We'll come pick it up later!”

 

Then he hadn't given it much more thought—other than thinking, whew, at least they hadn't shot it to the side of the building where there was a parking lot.It would've been bad if it'd broken a car windshield or something—but maybe not _that_ bad, because he actually knew how to replace a car windshield, although he'd have to buy the replacement out of pocket.

 

Finally, class was concluded.Franky locked up the door to the roof, and headed back to the lab with a little bit of a spring in his step.Robotics class evaluations always got him so pumped.

 

He hadn't taken any notes, but he remembered all the details of what everyone had presented, the area for improvement and the marks he'd decided each of his students deserved.Man, they had all made amazing progress in less than two months!  

 

And this was only the halfway point—the final products at the end of the semester were going to be totally out of the park, he was sure of it.He logged into the school terminal and started adding in the grades for the project, as well as his comments.He'd promised everyone he'd have his feedback and their grades entered in by the end of the day.  

 

The bots were worth 40% of their total grade—a pretty significant portion—with the remaining 60% of their grades being from three written tests.The class had already taken test one of three, and the scores had been all across the board, but if everyone kept doing as well as they had today, he bet the entire class would wind up passing.  

 

Franky couldn't _wait_ to see the completed bots in December.

 

Just as Franky finished entering the last student's grade, he was surprised when the head of the engineering department popped into his classroom, wearing a grim expression on his face.

 

Franky raised his eyebrows, waiting for the Department Head to say something.

 

“I'm going to need you to come with me to the main faculty office, Professor,” he said finally, not even bothering with a greeting.

 

“Uh, sure thing. Is everything okay?” Franky asked.

 

When he received no reply, his stomach sank.

 

Two hours later, Franky sat inside of his car, hands tightly clenching the steering wheel as he tried to calm his careening mind.

 

As it turned out, the woman from the faculty who'd seen the block fall had _not_ considered the experience harmless.In fact, she had reported that the “dangerous projectile” had been “mere inches” from hitting her, and if she hadn't jumped out of the way, she'd have been “sitting in a hospital bed at this very moment.”

 

Meanwhile, his student's bot had been seized and inspected, and just ten minutes ago, Franky had been asked to take a leave of absence while their investigation was pending.  

 

_“You can't have your students creating weapons, Franky.What the heck were you thinking? You're lucky we didn't get the police involved.”_

 

Dean Garp's words repeated in his head over and over again.

 

He squeezed the steering wheel even tighter.His student hadn't been trying to make a _weapon_ —she'd been testing force and pressure that could be applied to a mechanism utilizing only energy from the sun.  

 

Sucking in a labored breath, he finally willed himself to turn the key and crank the ignition.The key ring felt painfully barren without the key to the lab attached to it.

 

The key to _his_ lab.

 

He drove home and didn't really know what to do with himself, so he tinkered with the Halloween costume he planned on wearing that night.It was pretty much done, but hey, with a little extra time, he could probably make it even cooler than it already was.  

 

He had a huge bucket of candy ready, because he knew there were a ton of kids living in his apartment complex and the office had handed out these little paper pictures of pumpkins to put on the door for tenants who welcomed trick-or-treaters, since it wasn't like the apartments had porch lights.So Franky put it up, and fixed up his costume, and finally at around five o'clock, kids started knocking on the door, holding up big plastic pumpkin buckets and pillow cases and plastic bags with pictures of black cats and ghosts and skeletons.

 

Franky was dressed up like Frankenstein, with a big green rubber mask and bolts on his neck.Of course, he'd fixed the mask to make the bolts a bit more realistic, and to make them snap a little with electricity when he pushed on a tiny switch he kept cupped in the palm of his hand—only a slight shock, nothing that'd hurt him, probably, not that he planned on letting it touch his skin.

 

And the kids laughed, deadpanned, or screamed, and a couple of them rushed to hide behind their parents, and Franky's laughter boomed as he gave them all huge fistfuls of candy—his giant hands could grasp a lot of fun-sized snickers and kit-kats and tootsie rolls, after all.  

 

After seven o'clock, the traffic waned a bit, and by nine, there was no one else coming and his bucket of candy was reduced to almost nothing.

 

Franky took off his costume and remembered he hadn't eaten dinner.He rummaged through his kitchen, deciding on a frozen dinner; Salisbury steak and mashed potatoes, supposedly, although the authenticity was questionable.Maybe this would be a good time for him to take a serious shot at learning how to cook more than instant noodles and macaroni and cheese.

 

He sat down on his couch and turned on his TV, and realized, wow, he didn't want to learn how to cook.He wasn't looking for new hobbies; he liked what he did already, everything he did, way too much.

 

No longer hungry, he shoved his half-eaten dinner across the table.Sinking back deeper into the couch, he sipped at his Coke, staring at the TV, not really paying attention to whatever channel he'd put on.  

 

There was only one thing Franky really wanted to do and—and—it wasn't cooking.

 

It would be five days before he'd even find out if he would still get to do it anymore.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ahhhh chapter 3 was the longest chapter yet, and thank you so much for reading THANKS FOREVER. thanks again for all the reviews(!!) and all the things. THANKS HARDCORE FOR THE ART!! LIKE WOWWWOWOW. idk how many times we can say thanks but we want to say it a lot. so. 
> 
> we hope this chapter made you smile at least once and we hope even more to see you in chapter 4 ~ november!!!! and as always you can find the art from us and from everyone else through the link on our profile page


	4. November

Robin paused for just a moment outside of the conference room door, taking in a deep breath before she knocked.Keeping her mind clear would be critical over the next several minutes. On the exhale, she rapped her knuckle.She was ready.

 

“Come in,” a woman's voice called to her.She instantly recognized it as belonging to the assistant dean, Tsuru.With a calm confidence, Robin opened the door and stepped inside.

 

Tsuru immediately rose to her feet, her weathered hand beckoning to a chair at the end of the long table.“Please, have a seat, Professor.”Her friendly tone was as artificial as her smile.

 

“Thank you,” Robin said, returning an equally controlled smile.As she sat, Robin fluidly slipped her black leather messenger bag off of her shoulder, letting it rest against her leg.“I appreciate you all taking the time to see me on such short notice.”

 

She had actually only expected a couple of people to be there.Tsuru and Dean Garp were a given, but every seat at the long conference room table was occupied.Looking down the line, Robin recognized them as being the university's entire executive committee.

 

My, how intimidating.

 

Of course, the daunting line-up wasn't for her.But whoever was responsible for setting it up was certainly a little sadistic.The open seat was at the end of the table, so whoever was sitting there would feel eight pairs of eyes on them, as they got grilled by various questions.And the chair was adjusted so that it sat a little lower than the rest of the chairs.

 

It was sadly juvenile, and if the set-up had been meant for Robin, it would have been fairly unsuccessful.This was child's play to her—but to some, it would've surely caused a great deal of stress.

 

It was peculiar that they were going through these formalities for a non-tenured professor, honestly.That man must've really rubbed someone the wrong way, at some point in his career.

 

Oh well.It was time to get to work.She had a lot of insincere social pleasantries to cycle through before they could get to the point.  

 

Tilting her head disarmingly, Robin turned her gaze to Tsuru. “We haven't spoken often lately, but I've wanted to ask, how's your grandson doing?Surviving his first semester of law school?”

 

“Yes.Although he's quite busy, I heard,” Tsuru smiled thinly.Politely.Tsuru saw through what Robin was starting—although she likely hadn't guessed what Robin's agenda was just yet.

 

“I bet.Such an impressive accomplishment, for him to get into Harvard.You must be quite proud.”Robin folded her hands on the table in front of her.

 

“Indeed, I am.”Tsuru sat up a little straighter in her chair.  

 

Robin knew quite a few things about Tsuru's personal life, actually, so she was at no loss for things to say.If it was just Tsuru and Robin, they may have been stuck at an impasse of insincerity for some time before Robin could make her next move.But Dean Garp—he was probably oblivious to their subtleties.Garp only knew how to respond to confrontation.She needed him to speed this along.

 

At the appropriate moment, Robin turned her attention to Garp. “I just saw your grandson a few days ago, here at the school.He seemed quite energetic.”

 

Garp grit his teeth a little; Robin knew this was a topic he preferred to avoid.“Yeah, I suppose.”

 

“He often comes to the art and music hall to sit in on the more interesting classes.”She studied him carefully, noting the involuntary twitch in his brow.This was going to be quick.“Unfortunately, I've never had the pleasure of having him come to one of my lectures.” 

 

“Yeah, and hopefully you _won't._ I've asked him to stop doing that,” Garp muttered lowly.“But if you'll excuse me, Robin—uh, Professor—we're a bit limited on time right now.Could you tell us what you want?”

 

Her smile increased indiscernibly.Quick indeed—even quicker than she could have hoped.

 

“We have a disciplinary proceeding we need to begin in a few minutes,” Tsuru added, attempting to smooth over Garp's brusqueness.“From what I understand, you indicated you needed to see us quite urgently, which is why we agreed to speak to you now, rather than waiting until after the meeting.”

 

“But of course.”Robin reached into her messenger bag.“I'll do my best to be as brief as possible.”

 

 

* * *

 

Franky closed his eyes and struggled to focus on breathing normally.Even though he'd been just sitting there for what felt like hours, his heart was pounding like he'd just run a mile.Opening one eye, he glanced down at his watch for probably the hundredth time.  

 

He usually didn't even wear a watch.

 

The normally punctual dean—or assistant dean, because Franky was pretty sure she was the one who kept Garp on track—was over fifteen minutes late starting their meeting.Or was it a proceeding?Hearing, maybe? God, that sounded scary, he didn't want to think about that.  

 

Whatever it was, Franky had arrived early as well, so now he'd been sitting in an uncomfortable plastic lobby chair for over thirty agonizing minutes, with nothing to do but imagine what was about to happen.And everything he imagined was pretty damn awful.

 

He felt kind of sick—like his stomach was doing flip-flops.He'd barely been able to eat this morning.He was pretty certain he was going to throw up when all of this was over.Where was the most private place he could go for that, anyway?Oh, there was that back storage room in the lab—with the door closed, it was pretty hard to hear anything coming from inside of there.He'd tested it before.No particular reason, just because why not.So, okay, that was the plan—

 

But what if he never got the chance to go back to that nostalgic little lab room ever again?

 

Okay, he was definitely going to be super ill.He wiped a bead of sweat from his brow—was his hand actually _shaking_ a little bit?—before he checked his watch yet another time.

 

It seemed like the minute hand was moving a little bit slow, now that he thought about it.He'd definitely been there a lot longer than the watch claimed.Maybe he'd take a look at it later.He might have a lot of spare time on his hands—his stomach clenched a little. 

 

The echo of high heels from the hallway wrenched him away from his distressed thoughts.It might be someone finally coming to get him.As Franky nervously adjusted his tie—good, he hadn't unconsciously pulled it loose yet—he wondered if he looked as disheveled as he felt.He hated ties—they were dumb and constricting and made him feel like he was being strangled.  

 

Swallowing with difficulty—his mouth felt so _dry—_ he quickly smoothed back his hair as he looked up at the person approaching him.He expected it to be one of the office admins, so he was more than a little surprised to be facing his colleague, Nico Robin.  

 

Well, his colleague for now—his stomach did another flip.

 

But for some reason, she had a soothing effect on him.It felt a little easier to breathe and he felt his racing heart slow just slightly.He wasn't sure _why_ it was the case, but she was sort of a calming person.She had these cool, clear eyes.Her graceful, confident gait—even when she was wearing those shoes with the thin, spiky heel that he was pretty sure must have been extra hard to balance in.And her crisp, collected appearance, with not a single seam of her clothes twisted or a hair out of place.  

 

Oops, he was staring, he realized, so he started to turn his head away—when unexpectedly, she looked right at him.

 

Their eyes locked for a moment, and a slight smile crept across Robin's face.

 

Franky felt the breath hitch in his throat.It was a little weird, the impact it had on him—like the uncomfortable knots in his stomach turned to butterflies and he could suddenly breathe normally again.Robin had momentarily pulled him away from his anxiety with her smile.Franky was pretty sure he'd seen her make that expression before, but there was just something about that secretive smile, aimed straight at him.

 

In fact, he quickly glanced to his left and right, just to make sure—and nope, no one else was around.She'd definitely smiled at _him_.

 

Then she was gone, and Franky felt like he'd gained at least a little bit of his wherewithal.Good, at least now he could speak intelligently in his defense.He looked at the watch one more time.Twenty-five minutes late starting the meeting.

 

 At the thirty minute mark, he was finally summoned. He clenched his hands into fists as he rose to his feet, gathering all his courage.This was it.He was ready.

 

… And after all that, the meeting was less than ten minutes long.

 

“C-can you repeat that?” Franky stammered, his hands gripping the arms of the low chair a little too tightly.

 

The oppressive tension in the room was stifling.It was taking every ounce of effort for Franky to keep from loosening his tie.Like, he'd had to stop himself no less than eight times so far.

 

“I said, you're being permitted to keep your job,” Garp frowned, his jaw visibly clenched. “For the time being, anyway.”

 

Franky sucked in a deep breath, openly slumping back in his seat.He felt like something had snapped inside of him, instantly releasing all of the mounting tension.

 

“There are going to be a few conditions, of course,” Tsuru broke in, her cold eyes narrowing.  

 

Conditions?Man, that was fine—ten or twenty or a hundred conditions, as many as they wanted, he could _keep his job._ Franky's mind was reeling; this was far too good to be true.He hadn't quite known what to expect, but at the very least, he thought he'd have to plead his case—justify his actions and apologize. Defend his student.Defend himself. _Something._  

 

As Tsuru went down a list of things Franky was no longer allowed to encourage in his class—including the creation of any weapons, projectiles or anything that could be even faintly misconstrued as a weapon, Franky's eyes swept down the table. The entire executive committee was glaring at him, each one of them showing varying degrees of repugnance. 

 

Franky swallowed hard, realizing his throat was a little bit dry.His heart had fallen into his stomach when he first saw them all sitting there.But now that he was being told he could stay, their presence was super confusing.

 

Finally, Tsuru ceased talking, and Garp leaned forward, resting his elbows on the heavy oak table.“And let me tell you, Franky,” he started, speaking in a way that reminded Franky of just how much power he wielded, “we're going to have a zero tolerance policy when it comes to things like this now.If we so much as get the slightest _hint_ you're breaking any of these rules, you're gone.”

 

“I understand,” Franky replied, sitting up straight.“You won't have a single problem with me from now on, I promise.” 

 

“I doubt that,” the dean muttered.

 

“I suppose it goes without saying that this is going to affect your consideration for tenure in future years,” Tsuru added coldly.

 

Franky nodded.“Yeah, I understand.”  

 

Tenure, geez.That was honestly the last thing on his mind at the moment.He still had his _job_ and he still had no idea how things had turned out this well.

 

“And you better be grateful to Nico Robin for what she did for you,” Garp added, leaning back in his chair.

 

Franky pursed his eyebrows as Robin's secretive smile flashed across his mind again.Franky's gaze flitted down the table again.It really _didn't_ make sense that they'd be here unless they were doing a full-blown disciplinary hearing.

 

“The only reason you have your job—and I mean it, the _only_ reason—is because she threatened to leave hers,” Garp said flatly.“It put us in a very difficult position.”

 

Franky felt like the floor had fallen out from underneath him and for a few fleeting seconds, he literally lost the ability to form words.If Garp and Tsuru hadn't continued to tag-team lecture him, he seriously would've only been able to gurgle a couple of random syllables because _wow_ , he had no idea how to process that information.

 

Why the heck would Nico Robin even—

 

Suddenly the keys to his laboratory were returned to him and his mind was too flooded with emotions to actually think about it anymore.He was pretty sure he was going to cry—yep, he was gonna cry, this was so wonderful, and he barely managed to keep it together before he escaped the stifling conference room.

 

The first thing Franky did was go to the lab. _His_ lab.The lab he'd missed so terribly much for the last five days.There was a print-out on the door announcing that classes were canceled for the day, and he had to stop himself from ripping it down.But no, it was okay, because tomorrow they'd start up again.He ran to his desk to grab a sharpie so he could scribble a note underneath that classes would resume November 6th.  

 

After pausing for a moment, he drew a happy little dancing figure next to it.It didn't look too bad.Franky was actually pretty good at doodling.

 

Then he closed the lab door behind him, letting his gaze sweep across the room, totally flooded with relief and happy feelings because he would still get to come back there every day.He looked at all the brilliant and super cool inventions from his past students and big fat tears openly rolled down his cheeks.  

 

He was _back._ And shit, he was so freaking happy about it.

 

He sank down into one of the student workstation chairs, his legs suddenly feeling weak underneath him. Closing his eyes, he took in several deep breaths.Beyond the sterile smell of the room, there were also hints of burnt wires and machine oil.He ran his fingertips along the cool, sterile work table.The texture was a bit lost on him—he'd had a, uh, careless accident when he was younger involving a lot of electricity that had damaged the nerves in his hands—but even if he couldn't feel the tabletop's texture, he felt the realness beneath his fingers and that was enough.

 

He was back.What a fantastic feeling.

 

_The only reason you have your job is because she threatened to leave hers._

 

Garp's words flashed through his mind.Eyes snapping open, he jumped to his feet and ran out of the lab, clutching at his pocket for his cell phone.Then he remembered he was still wearing that stupid watch, and he checked the time.

 

Her class in the  science and engineering building had ended about fifteen minutes ago, so it was unlikely she was still around.She didn't have a devoted classroom like he did, so she had probably headed back to her office.Where would that be, anyway? 

 

Still running, he finally reached the doorway and leaned into it, hands pressed against the frame, panting slightly.He totally expected the classroom to be empty.

 

His heart skipped a beat when it wasn't.

 

Nico Robin was standing at the front of the deserted room, her back turned to him, erasing elegantly crafted words from a whiteboard.Wiping the last section away, she neatly set down the eraser and turned around, looking wholly unsurprised to see him.

 

“You... What did you... No, before that, _why?_ ” Franky stumbled, the incomprehensible sentence lingering in the air for a long moment.

 

“I'm not sure I understand the question,” Robin replied calmly.From her tone, Franky wasn't sure if she was annoyed or amused.

 

“What the heck did you do?” he blurted.

 

Robin smiled thinly—politely.It wasn't quite the same as her earlier smile.“Did everything go well for you today?”

 

“Of course, because of whatever you did.But I don't understand why—”

 

“I'm glad to hear that,” she cut him off smoothly.“Will you be starting back right away?”

 

“Uh, yeah, I guess so. I mean, they already canceled the class I was supposed to teach this afternoon, but tomorrow I'll be back.”

 

“That's great news.”

 

Franky smiled, running his fingers through his hair in relief.“Yeah, I'm really glad.”

 

Robin's smile increased just slightly—now that was more like the look from earlier.Franky's chest tightened a little bit.Man, she was even more of a knockout than usual when she made an expression like that.

 

“I have a meeting with a student back at my office in a few minutes, so I'll be leaving,” Robin said, walking toward him, making a move to slip past him into the hallway.

 

“Oh, okay.”He took a step back from the doorway.“But, uh, wait a second.”

 

“Yes?” She stopped in the doorway, standing just a few inches from him.  

 

“If you have time later, could we maybe...” Franky fumbled over the words, not sure the right way to ask the question.“Well, you know.Go somewhere.Show my appreciation.”

 

“For what?All I said were few words in your favor.”

 

Franky almost laughed—man, she'd done a hell of a lot more than that.

 

“I'm free this evening,” Robin added.

 

She actually sort of took him by surprise.“What?—Uh, I mean, yeah?That's great.” 

 

“Would you like to join me for a drink?” she asked.

 

Franky's mouth hung open in surprise for a moment—she'd sort of beat him to the punch.“Yeah, that'd be super,” he grinned widely, suddenly feeling like the blood was rushing to his head.  

 

That evening, Franky stood back near the doorway as Robin went to get them a table.Franky watched her walk toward the hostess, with that same fluid grace he was really starting to admire, when he noticed a man's head turn hard out of the corner of his eye.Franky's eyes shifted over to the stranger.

 

A red-haired man, who was sitting on one of the waiting area benches, was very blatantly staring at Robin, his eyes flitting up and down her body.Franky frowned.Although Robin didn't draw attention to herself, once she was noticed, it _was_ pretty hard to look away.At least, that was Franky's impression of her.

 

But okay, even if it maybe wasn't totally his business, this jerk was _really obviously_ checking her out and Franky couldn't help it.He was annoyed. 

 

Standing up a little bit straighter, he took another couple of steps into the restaurant, pointedly clearing his throat as he glared at the redhead.It was more than enough to catch his attention.The redhead looked up at him, and after regarding Franky for a moment with slightly widened eyes, he turned his head back toward the people he was waiting with.  

 

The corner of Franky's mouth turned up just slightly.He could look pretty intimidating, when he needed to.  

 

Robin turned around and beckoned for him to follow her, and they were led away to a table near the back.

 

At first glance, it had appeared to be kind of a fancy place, but Franky quickly realized she had picked it because of the crowd.Most of the happy hour patrons were in their thirties and up, as opposed to the college students that tended to flood every bar within a two mile radius of the school at this time of the evening.

 

Franky ordered whatever IPA they had on tap and Robin ordered a pinot noir.The image of her slender fingers lightly holding a wine glass suited her pretty well.

 

“So, I've been wondering all day.What the heck did you do earlier?”

 

She tilted her head slightly.“It was nothing special.I just reminded everyone what an asset you are to the school.”

 

“Well, yeah, but I'm sure they didn't really want to hear all that,”Franky said, scratching his head.  

 

“They needed a little bit of convincing,” she admitted.“But I came prepared.”

 

“What do you mean?”  

 

“I brought a few.... pieces of supporting evidence.”  

 

“What, supporting evidence?” Franky said with puzzlement.When she didn't elaborate, he gave her a look.“Come on, you have to tell me in more detail than that.”

 

Robin smiled again, and reached into the messenger bag she had set down on the seat next to her, folding over the top flap.It was filled with magazines and manila folders, which she pulled out and set on the table.Holding back the folders, she slid the magazines toward him.And he instantly recognized them—they were all popular robotics and engineering journal.She had about two dozen of them.  

 

Then he realized exactly which issues were in the stack. “These all have articles by me... You knew about all these?”

 

“Of course.They're all fascinating—you cover some very innovative topics.Very few articles are even available about them right now,” Robin replied. 

 

“Yeah, I like to keep ahead of everybody, if I can help it,” he said, his grin widening.This girl knew all about him... how about that.

 

“Other authors refer to you all the time, as well.The name 'Cutty Flam' is quite well known in the industry.”

 

“Yeah, uh, you don't... ever need to call me that,” he winced.“Just call me Franky.”

 

She raised an eyebrow.“Oh?Should I call you Professor Franky, like your students?”

 

“Just Franky,” he laughed, not entirely sure if she was serious.“So, what else did you pull out of your bag of tricks?”

 

“Oh, just a few more things to back up what great work you do.”She slid a hand over the manila folder, making no move to reveal its contents.

 

“Yeah, are you gonna show me?”

 

She took another sip of her wine, considering the question.“I guess I may as well,” she replied finally, sliding one of the folders across the table toward him.

 

He opened it, flipping through the first few pages with increasing surprise.“What is all this?” he asked finally, jaw agape as he look up at her.

 

“Just a few reports that I thought everyone should see.”

 

“Yeah, but... Some of the stuff in here.This one is a list of every article I've ever published and presentation I've ever had,” he said with amazement, holding up the stapled set of papers.He didn't even know if his resume has all this stuff on it.

 

“Yes,” Robin replied simply, taking another sip of her wine.

 

Franky was even more stunned by the next report in the packet.“What the hell, is this... I mean, this is...”

 

“It's the average time you spend logged into the school's server each day,” Robin filled in. 

 

“Yeah, I can see that.”

 

“It's imperfect to capture all of the hours you spend actually working, but it was enough to show everyone that you spend more than an adequate amount of time on work directly related to the school.”

 

Huh, he didn't realize he spent fifty hours a week logged in... Well, maybe that was pretty normal.He flipped to the next page.“Holy shit,” he murmured in disbelief, crinkling his brow.But a moment later, he heard something far more shocking than Robin's reports.

 

As the curse fell out of his mouth, Nico Robin _laughed_.

 

Franky jerked his head upward as he stared at her.He had never heard her laugh before—and even though it wasn't the loudest or most infectious laugh, it made him feel a little giddy.He wanted to hear it again sometime.He stuck making Nico Robin laugh on a mental to-do list, somewhere in the back of his head.

 

“I'm sure you can tell, but that's a chart comparing your average weekly hours logged in compared to the rest of your department,” Robin explained.

 

“Yeah, that's why I'm pretty fricking stunned.The time logs are one thing, but you made a _chart_ out of this?”

 

“Look at the next page.”

 

He complied, grinning stupidly and shaking his head from side to side as he looked at it.“What the hell.You made charts comparing me to the other departments' averages, too.How'd you even get this information?”

 

She smiled coyly.“I just asked one of the people in our IT department if we could generate any reports like that.”

 

“And they just gave it to you?”

 

“Yes,” she said simply, although he was pretty sure it couldn't have been as easy as she was making it sound.

 

“Geez, you're amazing!” he grinned.“I need to get you another drink.No, wait, how about dinner.Let's eat something—will you have dinner with me?” Franky asked eagerly, craning his neck to see if their server was in sight before he even heard her answer.

 

Robin laughed again and Franky was pretty sure his heart made a happy little skip.“Yes, I guess we can do that.”

 

“Super!” he exclaimed, just as he made eye contact with their waitress.After asking for another round of drinks and some menus, he turned back toward the manila folder.

 

“So, any more charts in here?Maybe a venn diagram?”

 

“No venn diagrams,” she smiled—more brilliantly than she had before.“There's a pie chart, though.”

 

“A pie chart?You're kidding me,” he said, shuffling through the pages.Indeed, there was—a pie chart and a couple more bar graphs, and all kinds of statistics comparing the average levels of students studying robotics and engineering as undergraduates versus as graduate students, with comparisons with the average levels of his own students.

 

“Your achievements are really impressive.The practical application of programming, physics, and calculus your students get to use are much more advanced than most students taking higher-level robotics courses,” Robin filled in.“What you do speaks for itself—all I did was remind Dean Garp and the others how important you are.”

 

“That's all you did, huh?” Franky asked carefully.“And that did the trick?”

 

“So it seems.”

 

“You just showed them all these papers and bar graphs, and they said okay, I can stay?”

 

“You're starting back tomorrow, aren't you?” 

 

Franky stared at her in astonishment, not missing her clever evasion of a straight answer, before sweeping his eyes over the papers now scattered across the table.This amazing woman had prepared all of this for him, _for_ _him_ , and she was brushing it off like it was no big deal.

 

And what was really scary was that all of the data she had brilliantly compiled had made absolutely no difference.According to Garp, the only reason he wasn't dismissed was because she had threatened to quit her job.  

 

Franky was pretty in awe of her over it, to be quite honest.Sure, he could build a robotic dog and program it to respond to over four hundred spoken commands.He could build weapons without a blueprint for reference.He had even once made a really energy efficient electric car—it was kept in a warehouse at the university somewhere, since the DMV had refused to issue a license plate for it so it could be driven on public roads.

 

The point was that he had countless spectacular achievements. But he sure as hell didn't have any power over other people. But Robin—she had somehow played exactly the right cards.

 

And apparently, she had no intention of telling him about the sacrifice she'd nearly made.

 

Franky took a long swig from his glass.He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, his eyes flitting toward hers.“Why'd you do all this for me, anyway?”

 

She smiled at him, and okay, it was maybe kind of dumb, but he thought her smile was a little dazzling.

 

“Because you're a wonderful teacher, Franky.” 

 

* * *

 

 

 

When Zoro walked into Nami’s bar with Luffy, he raised his eyebrows. Sanji was seated between Usopp and Chopper, his head craned back as he chugged the contents of his tall glass.

 

The group cheered when Sanji finished his drink, and Luffy announced their arrival by joining in the clapping and shouting, totally unaware as to what exactly he was supporting.

 

Sanji spun in his stool, gripping his wooden seat, and he grinned at Luffy. “Oh, hey!”

 

“What’re you guys doing?” Luffy asked as Nami grabbed him and Zoro a beer.

 

“We’re celebrating,” Usopp explained.

 

“Celebrating what?” Luffy continued, and Zoro glanced at Chopper, who looked about ready for a nap. But the kid was hanging on. He was always a trooper.

 

“Today,” Sanji said, rubbing his mouth, “is the first Saturday night I’ve had off in something like six or eight months, I think.”

 

Sanji might as well have been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. If anything, it was a reason for the group to drink and laugh and lose out on a lot of very important sleep. They always jumped at the chance. Well, several of them did.

 

Sanji’s gaze drifted from Luffy up to Zoro, and he still wore that unabashed, open grin, and Zoro looked away.

 

“You wanna do some shots with me, asshole?” Sanji asked, which caught Zoro by surprise, and he realized Sanji must’ve been drunk, _actually_ drunk, to propose such a ridiculous question to him, of all people.

 

Nami was already lining up six shot glasses along the bar. They were the only ones in there—it was about closing time. Nami, being the only employee on the clock in the little dive bar, was tasked with all closing duties, which she had performed over an hour ago. She locked the front entrance while her roommates argued over what they were about to drink.

 

The debate came down to Usopp, Luffy, and Sanji all suggesting different shots, and Zoro stood next to Chopper.

 

“What do _you_ wanna drink?” Zoro asked his youngest roommate, and the kid looked up at him from his barstool.

 

“Coffee, ideally. Lots of coffee. I shouldn’t be here.”

 

Zoro laughed and Sanji glanced over at him.

 

“Listen,” Nami said, and out of a shared semi-obedience to her, the group focused their attention. “It’s Sanji’s, like… day. Thing. It’s Sanji’s thing tonight, so he’s deciding, and the rest of you shut up, Jesus.”

 

Sanji looked absolutely elated over Nami designating him for something. It could’ve been anything, really, and he would’ve reacted just the same. Zoro rolled his eyes.

 

Sanji looked over at Zoro, still smiling his stupid, crooked smile, and he said, “It’s not really my day, though. It’s Zoro’s. Today’s his  birthday .”

 

The group was absolutely silent. Zoro’s mouth fell open at Sanji, and he was about to protest that it wasn't, but then he realized that nope, Sanji was fucking right.It was after midnight—making it his actual birthday.

 

“Oh, _shit!_ Is it?” Luffy cursed, seated past Usopp on the far end, leaned over the bar, his cheek nearly pressed against the wood next to his glass mug.

 

“November 11th, isn’t it?” Sanji asked Luffy, and, twisting around in his seat, Luffy searched his pockets for his phone, finally locating it and flipping it open and groaning at the date displayed on the screen.

 

“It’s your  _birthday_ _?_ ” Nami cut in, almost shouting, like she was accusing Zoro of doing something wrong.

 

“How the hell do you know when my  birthday  is?” Zoro asked, brow wrinkled, and Sanji’s cheeks were already red from drinking, it was his giveaway, he always wore everything on his sleeve—his emotions, his sobriety, the number of hours he hadn’t slept—and that shit-eating grin he was wearing at the moment was making Zoro’s jaw clench shut.

 

“I looked through your wallet when you left it out on the coffee table,” Sanji explained casually. Plainly. Blatantly. The sheer fucking _impudence_.

 

“I did too! We did together,” Luffy piped up from his spot on the far end, and Usopp snorted.

 

“The picture on your ID was really fucking cute,” Sanji thrummed, and Zoro, fuck, Zoro hadn’t been there ten minutes and he was already going to lay Sanji out, he was really going to do it, he was going to punch him in his smug fucking face, and his knuckles were white, clenched into the tightest fist he could manage.

 

“It’s your  _birthday_ _!_ ” Nami interrupted, and Sanji turned his smile on her, and Zoro’s rage was momentarily averted. He looked at Nami, grimacing at the expression on her face. She leaned over the bar a little, and Sanji leaned in a bit with her, although she easily ignored and deflected their dumbass roommate, and she said to Zoro, “You almost got away with it.”

 

“I couldn’t let that happen,” Sanji added, and Zoro glared at them both—namely Sanji.

 

“So, Zoro, what’re you drinking tonight?” Nami smiled, gesturing to the collection of bottles stored along racks behind her.

 

The entire group waited for his decision.

 

He could feel his eyebrow twitch just slightly. “Whiskey.”

 

Nami poured six shots of straight whiskey, and Zoro felt a little guilty when he remembered Chopper and the kid’s taste in booze, but, whatever, he’d just have to learn to like it. Everyone held their shot glasses up to Zoro, and they sang the  birthday  song at him, except for Sanji, that stupid fucker, who couldn’t stop laughing at Zoro’s clearly heated expression.

 

When they all went to down their drinks, Sanji made the mistake of glancing at Zoro again, and he choked, snorting alcohol up his nose, and Zoro pursed his lips together, trying not to smile.

 

“You’re a fucking idiot,” Zoro told Sanji as he watched him cough, one hand covering his dripping face, empty shot glass in the other.

 

“How old are you now, Zoro?” Usopp asked, sliding his glass towards Nami’s side of the bar.

 

“Twenty-two.”

 

“So,” Nami said, holding the bottle of whiskey she’d used to pour the last round, “You have twenty-one more shots to take. Right?”

 

“Hell no,” Zoro said, looking at her like she was fucking insane, and she scoffed.

 

“Oh, but aren’t you some big drinker? Didn’t you once say you could drink me under the table?” Nami pressed, tapping her chin.

 

“Twenty-one shots is, like, two fifths,” Zoro said, eyeing the bottle she had in her hand.

 

“I’ve seen you put away a bottle on your own,” Sanji said, lighting a cigarette, and Nami narrowed her eyes at him, warning him that he had to smoke the rest of his cigarettes outside or she’d get shit for it. The owner had some kind of nutso-super sense of smell.

 

“Zoro, get drunk! It’s your  birthday !” Luffy shouted, holding up a fist in support.

 

Nami poured Zoro another shot and slid it in front of him. He frowned at it. “Damn you, Nami.”

 

“It’s not my fault it’s your  birthday !”

 

“Match me,” Zoro said evenly, looking up at her.

 

“What?”

 

“Match me shot for shot. I won’t do twenty-something of them, but I’ll drink until you can’t anymore.”

 

Everyone watched the exchange between Nami and Zoro.Sanji sucked languidly on his cigarette, ashing it in Chopper’s little plastic cup that was half-filled with tap water.

 

“I feel like you’re underestimating me,” Nami smiled, holding her hand out. Zoro shook it and the competition was on.

 

An hour later, or maybe two, he didn’t know, Zoro stood alone in the bathroom, taking the longest piss of his life, and he would never fucking admit it in a hundred years, but he had underestimated Nami.

 

He drank a lot in general, yes. He could be classified as a heavy drinker, he supposed. Did he drink every single day? Okay, maybe, yes. Did he have a problem? No. Did he get piss drunk every night and struggle with being a member of society? _No_.

 

Was he legitimately drunk, very drunk, for the first time in a long time? _Yes._

 

But so was Nami, which was, admittedly, funny to see. She was an honest drunk. She abandoned what few filters she had, and she was open, and almost a little vulnerable in a way, and Zoro had found himself laughing with her several times throughout the night. He smiled to himself, alone in the bathroom, feeling the room shifting around him as he swayed a little. 

 

When he left the bathroom, rather than returning to his housemates, he slipped down the short hallway and out the back door, wanting to feel the cold night air on his face for a minute before he went back to the group.

 

The crisp air hit him as he opened the door and stepped outside.

 

“She’s giving you a run for your money, isn’t she,” came a familiar honeyed voice from the darkness.

 

Zoro looked down and to his right, and he saw Sanji there, sitting on the ground and leaned up against the brick building, smoking and staring up at the faint stars.

 

“She can drink her face off, I’ll give her that much,” Zoro said, and he eased himself down onto the cold concrete of the back patio next to Sanji.

 

“She’s an incredible person,” Sanji maintained.

 

“I guess she is,” Zoro agreed, and maybe it was the first time he’d ever openly agreed with Sanji. When Sanji didn’t say anything else, Zoro scrunched his nose at him. “Fuck you for announcing my  birthday , by the way.”

 

“Why? You’re having fun, aren’t you?” Sanji asked, pulling a leg closer to his chest and resting his chin on it. Smoke floated past his teeth and his lips as his spoke, coming out of his nose, like he was filled to the brim with it, and he exhaled loudly, expelling it all, and rolled his eyes up to Zoro’s. The presumptuous smile on his face lit up in the moonlight and streetlights that lined the back alley.

 

“My  birthday  isn’t any of your fucking business,” Zoro said, ignoring Sanji’s actual question.

 

“I feel like  birthdays  actually _are_ the business of your friends, dumbshit.”

 

“Which you aren’t,” Zoro pointed out.

 

“Yeah, but they are. They’re your friends. Enjoy them while you have them. For Christ’s sake.” Sanji leaned back again, sniffing, and he rolled his cigarette between his thumb and forefinger.

 

They sat there in silence, Sanji smoking his cigarette and coughing every once in a while—he’d been coughing more than he normally did, lately, maybe—and Zoro watching the blinking red lights of a plane flying miles above them. It was cold out, but Zoro didn’t feel it much.

 

“It’s fucking freezing, lets go inside,” Sanji said, flicking his cigarette into the shadows in front of them, his knees popping as he stood, and he wiped the dust and dirt from his trousers. “Nami’s probably down for round fifteen, and Usopp’s driving.”

 

They didn’t count the number of shots they had. Well, they started to, and then they forgot to, and by the time they remembered, they were too far in. It was too difficult to keep track over Luffy’s loud laughter and Sanji’s cursing and Usopp and Nami shouting at each other.

 

As far as the competition went, Nami eventually gave up, and she came around the other side of the bar, squeezing between Chopper and Zoro.

 

“Chopper, you’re the bartender now, and I need water, and you have to get it for me,” she commanded. She leaned on Zoro, their shoulders together, and he looked down at her. She sighed loudly, her eyes on the empty shot glasses lining the bar. “You really can drink a lot.”

 

Chopper walked around the bar and filled a large glass with the tap, and he slid it to her, smiling, looking more tired than any teenage boy should look.

 

They had a couple more beers and listened to Luffy explain how, while Men in Black was an excellent movie, there was actually a conspiracy theory that there _actually were_ men in black suits that worked to hide and contain information about aliens, and, did you know, some people thought the men in black actually were aliens, and—

 

“We should probably go sleep,” Usopp interrupted, and Luffy looked past him, down the row of his roommates seated at the bar. Sanji and Nami both had their arms folded over the smooth wooden bar top, their faces buried in the sleeves of their jackets. Between them, Zoro had all his weight on one arm, his jaw resting in his palm, trying really fucking hard to keep his eyes open. Chopper was asleep in one of the booths on the other side of the room.

 

“Oh. Yeah, probably,” Luffy conceded, and he slipped out of his chair to go shake Chopper into consciousness.

 

Zoro flicked his finger over the back of Sanji’s head to wake him up, and Sanji grumbled a string of rude phrases at him as he dragged himself from his seat. Chopper and Luffy took up spots on either side of their blond roommate once he was finally up and moving, but he was sure-footed as he could be, hands in his pockets and his head dipped down, and Zoro trailed a few paces behind the small group. Usopp flipped off the lights and carried Nami, who was very insistent on staying mostly asleep, on his back, leaning forward and balancing her weight while he made sure the bar doors were locked behind them, pocketing her work keys.

 

Usopp deposited Nami in the front seat, which she leaned back immediately, and Luffy sat behind her, the headrest of the passenger seat practically in his lap. 

 

Chopper and Zoro filled in the rest of the middle seat, and Sanji leaned over them, folding down the third rear-facing seat to create a big open trunk area. And then he fucking climbed over the three of them, shoving past them and over the seat back, sprawled out across the trunk, and promptly passed out again.

 

When they got home and everyone started yawning their ways inside, Zoro slid out of the car and opened up the back hatch, and the yellow light from their lone streetlamp poured down onto Sanji’s face, and he squeezed his eyes shut tighter.

 

“We’re home.”

 

“Leave me,” Sanji groaned, folding his arms over his chest, his legs bent, knees sticking up in two different directions.

 

Zoro grabbed Sanji by his bony ankles and _pulled_ until Sanji was halfway out of the car—his lower half, anyway—and he leaned over the blond and curled two fists around the front of his button-up shirt, yanking him upwards and onto his feet.

 

Sanji’s eyes fluttered open and he put his hands on Zoro’s shoulders, standing directly in front of him, steadying himself in their sudden proximity, adapting to a new center of gravity. “Okay, I’m up,” he said, his bloodshot gaze coming into focus on Zoro’s face.

 

“You shouldn’t sleep in the goddamn car,” Zoro said, and Sanji’s pupils were huge, still adjusting to the low light.

 

“Right.”

 

Sanji took a step backwards, away from Zoro, and he turned and shut the trunk of Usopp’s car. Zoro trailed behind him through the yard, and Sanji managed to almost fall up the porch stairs, recovering before he walked in the front door. The resident chef trudged directly to one of their larger couches and collapsed onto it, and as Zoro was closing and locking the door, he noticed Nami already passed out on the other couch. Everyone else had made it to their rooms, it seemed.

 

Essentially alone, kicking off his shoes and shrugging off his jacket, Zoro smiled a little.

 

 

* * *

 

That was it.Usopp was done.His brain literally couldn't handle another technical phrase or equation.

 

He shoved his textbook across his desk like it was offensive, until it hit the wall with a noisy _thunk_.  

 

He really _did_ need to read that chapter though.As he leaned back in the uncomfortable desk chair, stretching his arms upward, extending his spine, Usopp contemplated going to sleep so he could get up early the next morning.Yeah, right, because that had ever worked for him.

 

Well, he didn't have work tomorrow.Maybe that'd be enough to get him motivated.  

 

His cell phone vibrated in his pocket, and he leaned forward as he pulled it out, his eyebrows raising slightly at the innocuous text message on the screen.  

 

_“Come over?”_

 

It was from Nami—who was literally across the hall from him.  

 

With a light sigh, he rose to his feet and trudged over to her room, not even bothering to knock as he walked inside.  

 

“You could've just yelled at me,” he told her teasingly, slamming the door closed behind him.But his expression quickly twisted into a frown as he looked down at her—something was definitely wrong.

 

Nami was sitting cross-legged on the floor, her back to the door, with an exaggerated number of books surrounding her.Like, a cartoon-ish amount.She must've emptied out a shelf at the library or something.

 

But as soon as she turned around, Usopp instantly recognized the panic in her eyes.He'd never really seen her make a face like that before.He froze for a moment, his gaze locked on her, and his brain fluttered through all the questions to ask, and he couldn't figure out which one to go with.

 

After some deliberation and consideration, he wisely settled on, "What's wrong?"

 

“Usopp, I need help,” she pleaded—but it wasn't like how Usopp'd ever heard her plead for something before.Because okay, he'd heard her act before, to get someone to do something for her.Nami was like master-level at getting her way.But this was different.

 

He quickly approached her, dropping to his knees next to her. “What's going on?”

 

“I really messed up.”  

 

“Okay, uh, what'd you do? Can we fix it?”

 

A long pause.“I have a—a paper due tomorrow.”

 

“A paper?” Usopp repeated.“Okay, um, have you started it yet?”

 

Nami averted her gaze.“No.”

 

“Okay...”

 

“I had it in my head that it was due on the twenty-fourth.So earlier, I got all these books, I looked up all these articles and printed them off, and I thought, hell yeah, I'm gonna get a head start on this paper.”She closed her eyes, taking in a deep breath.“And I just pulled out the assignment and—the fourteenth.It's due on the fourteenth.”

 

“Wow.That's, uh.Really unfortunate.”He didn't really know what else to say.

 

“ _I know,_ ” she hissed.“I really fucked up.”

 

“How much of your grade is it worth?”

 

“Forty percent,” she said quietly. 

 

Usopp groaned.Shit.That was kind of a lot.“You can just turn it in late though, right?”

 

“Yeah, that was my first thought.But then I remembered, on the first day, the professor went _on and on_ about how he's got zero tolerance for late work, and how students have no appreciation for deadlines.”

 

“Geez, okay.”Usopp thought about all the times he'd turned in a paper late.Good thing he didn't have classes with that guy.

 

“He's going to dock my points so much if I don't get this done,” Nami went on.“Plus, he holds grudges—and I'm going to have to take a couple more classes with this guy for my major.”

 

“What if you're deathly ill?”

 

Nami rolled her eyes.“He'd expect me to email it, even if I can't go to class.”

 

“Huh, yeah, you're right.”Usopp wracked his brain.“But if you were hospitalized...”

 

She narrowed her eyes.“Hospitalized because of what?”

 

“Um.I guess it'd have to be an injury.Hit by a car?”Well, it was the easiest thing that came to mind.

 

Her glare grew a little more intense.“Are you offering to run me over?”

 

“No,” Usopp sighed.“You better just write the damn paper.What's the class, anyway?”

 

“Remote sensing of the ocean and atmosphere.”

 

Geez, that sounded terrible.Meteorology.Weather.He understood a lot of the basics, but something like this...Usopp picked up one of the books nearest him and thumbed through it.“I don't even know what that is, Nami.I'm not sure how I can help you.”

 

Nami pointed at the laptop on her bed.“Just... type for me, okay?I'll tell you everything to say.”

 

Oh, that was actually a pretty good idea.Usopp pinched the bridge of his nose.“Okay.Uh—let me get some coffee real quick.Otherwise I'll never make it.You want coffee?”

 

“Bring the whole pot,” she said gravely.  

 

“Okay.”

 

“And sugar.”

 

“I know.”

 

“And that fancy creamer.The cinnamon one.”

 

He turned back to give her a look, although she was completely fixated on one of the many books surrounding her.

 

“I know,” he repeated quietly, mostly to himself.Like he didn't know how she liked her coffee by now.

 

Nine hours and two pots of coffee later, Nami had a paper that she felt like she could turn in without looking like a complete idiot.Usopp relinquished the laptop to her so she could do the final tweaks as he chugged the rest of the coffee in his mug.  

 

He'd actually given up on cream and sugar a couple hours ago. He hated black coffee, but he wasn't drinking it because he wanted it.It was a goddamn necessity.

 

Usopp flopped down on the area rug next to Nami's bed and took out his phone.5:23.He'd been awake nearly twenty-four hours—5:30 had been the time he'd gotten up for his shift at the coffee shop yesterday.Well, it certainly wasn't the first time.Definitely wouldn't be the last.

 

“Good enough,” Nami murmured to herself, clicking the laptop closed and practically throwing it onto her nightstand.“I'm gonna reread it one more time before I print it.”

 

“Yeah, good idea.”He was sure they were both in the same boat—that they couldn't proofread for shit right now.

 

“You printing at the computer lab?”  

 

“Yeah,” Nami replied, flicking off the lights.She paused to prod Usopp in the ribs with her toes before she flopped into her bed.“Come on, let's sleep.”

 

“Okay,” he said tiredly, and he nearly contemplated falling asleep right there on the floor.But, Nami's bed was much more comfortable, even if it was a bit small for the two of them.

 

“I'm setting an alarm for 7:30.You set one, too.”

 

“Huh?”

 

“That way, we definitely won't oversleep.”

 

Usopp yawned.“Okay, fine.”He took out his phone and set the alarm, double-checking it three times to make sure he didn't pick the wrong option.He'd definitely picked “PM” instead of “AM” when he'd tiredly set an alarm before.

 

“An hour and a half.That should give me enough time to read it, print it, and get to my class,” Nami went on, her voice growing more sleepy by the moment.

 

Nodding tiredly, Usopp rolled over onto his knees and elbows and pushed himself to his feet.Then he set his cell phone on Nami's desk—if he had to stand up to turn off the alarm, he definitely wouldn't sleep through it.

 

She turned toward the wall, nestling her back into his side.For a moment, he got stuck on how warm and soft she was next to him, and how her hair smelled faintly of oranges, and their hair was all over and kind of suffocating him slightly, but, no, it was fine.He was utterly exhausted, so it only took a moment for him to drift asleep.At some point during the morning, he rolled onto his side and hooked his arm around her.

 

The sound of the phone-alarm was literally physically painful.Two hours of sleep was like an entire sleep cycle but Usopp still felt like he'd been hit by a truck as he half-slid, half-fell out of the bed to get to his phone.

 

“Come on, Nami,” he croaked, his voice still hoarse from sleep.He reached out and pressed his hand on her arm, gently shaking her awake.

 

“Already?” Nami groaned, squeezing her eyes closed even tighter in protest.

 

“Yeah.Come on, or you won't have enough time.”

 

“Okay,” she muttered, grabbing for her phone. When she didn't get up, he leaned over to see what she was doing.

 

“Who the heck are you texting?”

 

“Sanji.”

 

“What?Why?”

 

“I need his coffee,” she said, matter-of-factly.

 

“He's definitely asleep.”They'd actually heard him stumble up to his bedroom just a few hours ago.

 

“He'll make it for me,” she said, sitting upright as she clicked “send” on the message.

 

“I can make you coffee, you know.”

 

“His is better.”

 

“It's my _job_ to make coffee.”

 

“His is better,” she repeated, stretching.

 

Her phone vibrated back almost immediately, and before Nami had even placed her feet on the floor, Usopp heard Sanji sluggishly heading down the hallway toward the stairs.

 

“You're giving me a ride to the computer lab, right?” Nami asked.

 

“Shouldn't you have asked me that before you decided what time to wake up?” She'd never make it if she walked, and Usopp knew she knew it.

 

Nami shrugged.“I didn't think you'd say no.”

 

Usopp smirked.True—and he'd already planned on it.But he sure as hell wasn't going to tell her that.

 

 

* * *

 

“Hey, you sound like shit.” 

 

“Thanks,” Sanji said graciously, clearing his throat from behind his cigarette. He sat at the kitchen bar, half-watching the giant television across the room while he nursed a glass of water. Today’s show was about secret KGB documents from the cold war regarding alien crash-landings and autopsies. Super fucking fascinating. 

 

Usopp gave Sanji a thumbs-up from where he was wedged in the loveseat and went back to his textbook. 

 

A few days passed. 

 

“Sanji, that cough sounds awful.” 

 

Sanji grinned at Nami from his spot on the opposite end of the long couch, wrapped up in a fuzzy blanket from his bedroom. It was fucking cold in that house. 

 

“You’re _concerned_ about me.” 

 

“You’re a concerning person in general,” she deadpanned without looking up from her phone. 

 

“Thank you!” 

 

“Not necessarily a compliment.” 

 

Sanji meant to say something about how her words were always compliments to him or something, something really fucking cheesy, but he was interrupted by his own sudden coughing fit and couldn’t get a word in. 

 

Nami raised her eyes to him and waited for him to finish. 

 

“Maybe you smoke too much.” 

 

Sanji shook his head, clearing his throat, trying to scratch the fucking itch that wouldn’t go the hell away. “Definitely not.” 

 

Nami rolled her eyes at him and went back to her phone, and Sanji stood after a moment and let the blanket fall to the couch, and he walked to the bathroom to hock up all the shit coating his throat into the toilet and fuck, he was thinking about maybe just carrying around some kind of cup or trash can to spit that shit into because he was tired of getting up every twenty minutes. 

 

But fuck that, that was disgusting. Sanji wrinkled his nose at the fat loogie floating in the toilet and flushed it with the sole of his shoe, shivering a little, his arms folded tight across his chest. 

 

Another week passed. 

 

Sanji stood outside the front door, about to fucking kick it down because god _damn it_ his house keys sucked ass and—he kept jiggling them, twisting the knob back and forth—he couldn’t get the front door open and he really just needed his keys recut because nobody else had this problem apparently and—

 

The door suddenly unlocked with him still leaning on it and wrestling the doorknob, and Sanji nearly fell into the house. 

 

Glaring at the door, he yanked his key from the knob and slammed it shut. 

 

Sanji stood there, pointing his head down while he coughed up a lung and yanked off his coat. He fumbled for a pack of cigarettes and of course couldn’t find his lighter. He coughed harder, and at this point, he was just trying to scratch the itch in his throat. He had a headache from it. 

 

“Dumbfuck, if you’re going to stand around and die slowly, you should do it quieter or somewhere else entirely.” 

 

Sanji’s eyes swept to the couch where his very least favorite motherfucking roommate was clearly just waking up from a cozy little afternoon catnap. 

 

“Fuck you,” Sanji said to Zoro, because he couldn’t say much else amid all his hacking, and after a moment he managed to clear his throat and take a deep breath. He knew his cheeks were red. They fucking did that all the time over basically anything. His eyeballs felt like they were going to pop out of his head. 

 

Sanji found his lighter in one of his coat pockets and finally lit his fucking cigarette and started coughing all over again.

 

“You look like an idiot,” Zoro informed him, sitting up straighter and stretching, the joints in his elbows popping when he hyper-flexed them and fuck, Sanji was so grossed out by that shit. 

 

“That’s a—little hypocritical—of you,” Sanji said between throaty coughs into his fist, and, fuck, he opened the front door again and leaned outside to spit out all the goddamn phlegm in his mouth over the porch railing, oh god, eugh, gross. 

 

“Maybe at least stop smoking.” 

 

“Fuck, just shut _up_ ,” Sanji groaned, shutting the door and walking past Zoro to go find a bottle of water or something in the fridge. 

 

“You could always do what normal people who aren’t raging idiots do and go see a doctor.” 

 

Sanji straightened up from his survey of the fridge and turned around. “Do I look like I have health insurance to you?” 

 

Zoro shrugged. “There’s always Chopper.” 

 

“Oh yeah,” Sanji said, unscrewing the cap from the bottle of water he’d successfully located. “Forgot about him.” 

 

Zoro snorted. “Some friend you are.” 

 

“Well, he hides in his room all the time—and also, fuck you.” Sanji took a long slow drink of his water because he wasn’t actually thirsty, he just wanted to coat his throat with something cold. 

 

“He’s hiding in his room right now. You should go talk to him.” 

 

Sanji ignored Zoro for a minute, trying to smoke his cigarette, although he couldn’t do much more than puff on it. But the smoke burned his throat so much that it actually worked well for scratching the itch. Plus, he needed it. Especially when dealing with fucking Zoro. 

 

Fucking Zoro. 

 

Wow, Sanji didn’t want to think about that at the moment. He squeezed his eyes shut and rubbed them, sighing. 

 

“I should make him coffee or something if I’m going to hassle him with this,” Sanji mumbled towards his lap. 

 

“Probably.” 

 

Sanji shot Zoro a look and then went back to ignoring him. 

 

He prepared Chopper’s coffee just the way he loved it—three million scoops of sugar and drowned in milk and whipped cream on top. Sanji made a cup of black for himself because coffee would probably feel really good on his throat, and he tilted his head back and pointed the aerosol can upside down and filled his mouth with whipped cream before sticking it back in the fridge. 

 

“Fucking gross. Aren’t you supposed to be some fancy chef?” 

 

“Fancy chefs like whipped cream too, dick,” Sanji said slowly, his mouth still full. Whipped cream also worked really well for coating his throat, which was a huge bonus before he started coughing it all up again. He spat a mouthful of gross into the sink and rinsed it down. 

 

“Go talk to Chopper, dipshit.” 

 

“ _I am!_ ” 

 

“Are you afraid of doctors?”

 

“Obviously fucking not, we live with one.”

 

Sanji walked to Chopper’s door, and he was extremely dismayed when Zoro got his dumb ass off the couch and walked over behind him, and when Sanji paused, two cups of coffee in his left hand, Zoro leaned past him and knocked loudly, and Sanji fucking seethed. 

 

Sanji could hear the music blaring in Chopper’s room. 

 

After a few seconds, the door opened, and Chopper looked up at them, raising his eyebrows at the expression on Sanji’s face. “Uh—what’s up?” 

 

Sanji extended a cup of coffee to Chopper. “Will you examine me?” 

 

“Will I what?” 

 

“You’re a doctor and Sanji’s sick, so do your thing,” Zoro said from behind Sanji. 

 

“I’m _not a doctor_ ,” Chopper said, his voice thick with exasperation. “You should go to an actual doctor. I’m surprised you haven’t already.” 

 

“If you—“ Sanji coughed, and Chopper took the offered coffee so Sanji could properly hack into his fist, “—thought I was sick, why didn’t you say anything!” 

 

“You’re an adult, you should know when you need to see a doctor!” Chopper shouted back at him, and Sanji tried to look intimidating but mostly he just wanted to stop coughing long enough to sleep for a few hours. 

 

“Either way,” Sanji said, clearing his throat again, cupping his fingers around his remaining mug and holding it close to his face. “I’m not paying for a real doctor, so if you care whether or not I live or die, you’ll use your boy-genius skills to figure out what’s wrong with me.” 

 

Chopper threw his hands up into the air and turned, walking towards his desk, leaving his door open in a wordless invitation for Sanji and Zoro to follow him. Chopper pointed at the bed, commanding Sanji to sit, and he turned down the music blasting from his shitty stereo. There were books piled all over his desk and on the ground next to it. 

 

Sanji took a long drink of his coffee and held it out to Zoro, silently threatening to spill it down the front of Zoro’s dumb shirt if he didn’t catch it and hold it for him. Zoro hurriedly grabbed the steaming cup and gave Sanji a nasty look. Sanji turned and sat on Chopper’s bed. 

 

Chopper pulled one of those doctory things from the bottom drawer of his desk. 

 

“You say you’re not a—” Sanji coughed, “—doctor, but you have the listening thing.” 

 

“Stethoscope. And shut up,” Chopper replied, putting the earbud-headphone part in his ears and pressing the listening part of the stethoscope against the front of Sanji’s shirt. “Breathe like a normal person.” 

 

“I am.” 

 

Chopper gave Sanji a look that he did _not_ appreciate receiving from some shitty fucking teenager. Without a word, Chopper turned Sanji’s shoulders so that he was facing away from him, and he slipped his hand up Sanji’s shirt and pressed the fucking cold listening part against his bare back. 

 

“Keep breathing.” 

 

“What else am I going to d—“ Sanji started coughing again and Chopper withdrew. Still with no comments to make, Chopper walked to his desk again and produced a thermometer and held it out to Sanji. 

 

“Hold this under your tongue.” 

 

Sanji did as he was told. 

 

From his spot where he was standing by the door, Zoro spoke up, “For not being a doctor, you know what you’re doing.” 

 

Chopper glanced at Zoro, doing that thing where he tried not to smile as he said, “Well, I learned a lot from my grandmother—she was the only doctor in our little town. But stop trying to flatter me, asshole. Just shut up and stay over there.” 

 

The thermometer under Sanji’s tongue beeped, and Chopper grabbed it from his mouth before Sanji even had a chance to do so, and Chopper frowned at the digital reading displayed on the little screen before ejecting the tip of it into the trash. 

 

“You have a fever.”

 

“Yeah?” 

 

Chopper pulled his phone from his pocket and turned on the flashlight app and told Sanji to open his mouth, and once again, Sanji obeyed. Chopper shined the light on his phone into Sanji’s mouth, and honestly, Sanji didn’t want to hear about what his throat looked like and he _fucking hated this._  

 

“Stick out your tongue and say ‘ah’ and—I don’t have anything sterile to hold your tongue down so just, try to open your mouth really wide and keep your tongue flat, alright,” Chopper said, and Sanji was trying so fucking hard not to cough in his face. 

 

Sanji glanced over at Zoro and _fuck_ that smug look on that bastard’s face, fuck this whole thing—he was being examined by a teenager and this was fucking ridiculous and Zoro was _laughing at him_ , and Sanji snapped his mouth closed and turned his head to glare at Zoro, and he was going to tell him the fuck off, but Chopper cut him off.

 

“I think you probably have pneumonia. Bronchitis is possible, but things were rattling in there,” he said, nodding towards Sanji’s chest. 

 

Zoro snorted. “Figures you have some senior citizen disease.” 

 

Again, Chopper interrupted Sanji before he could snap at Zoro. 

 

“Not just old people—infants are also very susceptible.” 

 

Zoro laughed outright and Sanji was about to lose his fucking shit, but Chopper kept talking. 

 

“But it’s not an age thing, really,” Chopper continued, folding his arms over his chest. “Pneumonia is often caused by a crappy immune system.” Sanji got another _look_ from Chopper. “Smoking puts you at a way higher risk.” 

 

Zoro was grinning and Sanji wanted to backflip into the sun. 

 

“Drinking also puts you at a higher risk,” Chopper said pointedly to Zoro, and okay, Sanji felt a little better after seeing that asshole under the same fire. 

 

“Alright, anyway, what am I supposed to do? Do I go get… medicine? What medicine do I take?” Sanji asked, standing up, his hands going to his pockets, and he curled his fingers around his crumbled pack of cigarettes because _fuck._  

 

“You need to be diagnosed by an _actual doctor._ You need an x-ray, and for that, you need a doctor’s referral.” 

 

“I obviously can’t afford an x-ray. Or a doctor.” 

 

Chopper rubbed his face, and Sanji felt a little guilty for making him so frustrated. 

 

“There’s a free clinic twenty minutes away by bus, and it’s open for two more hours, and if you leave right now, they can probably get you in,” Chopper said, grabbing one of his notebooks off his desk, along with a pen, and he scribbled the address and which bus stop it was closest to onto a piece of paper and ripped it out and held it out to Sanji. “A chest x-ray will be less than two hundred dollars without insurance. But probably more than a hundred.” 

 

Sanji groaned and took the fucking paper and ended up coughing all over himself. 

 

“The antibiotics also became significantly more expensive this year for some reason—even the generic stuff.” 

 

Fucking shit.

 

See, the thing was, Sanji actually could afford this shit. Well, it wouldn’t sink him. Honestly, he probably made more money than anyone in the house, except for maybe Luffy, because who knew how much fucking money that idiot made, and how the hell he did it was also a mystery, and Sanji wasn’t going to ask. The point here was that Sanji didn’t _want_ to drop a couple hundred bucks or more on this fucking bullshit cough and _god fucking damn it._

 

He didn’t want to ride on the bus to a fucking free clinic and sit there with a bunch of fucking sick people. He didn’t want to be examined by some fuckoff doctor who was just going to tell him what Chopper already told him, and who was probably going to advise him to quit smoking and talk about health and blah blah _fuck._ Sanji didn’t want to get an x-ray. He didn’t want to know what his lungs looked like, and if they tried to show him the goddamn x-ray picture thing, he was going to flip out and, fuck, he couldn’t do this today. He’d just gotten home, for fuck’s sake. 

 

“Sanji,” Chopper said, snapping Sanji out of his thoughts. “Go right now. You could be contagious. And if it’s bacterial, it can mess you up. Like, it can spread to your blood, you could lose part of your lungs, you could _die, Sanji_.” 

 

“Fucking _Christ_ , I will fucking go right now,” Sanji said, trying not to scream, and he was trying to take a deep breath, but even that was too fucking difficult, and he was just going to calmly walk out of the room and go somewhere, probably not to the fucking doctor, but he was going to leave and calm down and—

 

“I’ll go with you,” Zoro said from his spot in the doorway, still holding Sanji’s coffee and blocking his path, and he was smiling, obviously entertained by this shitshow. 

 

“Literally the last fucking thing I want in the world right now. I would rather snort tabasco sauce.” 

 

“I know,” Zoro grinned. 

 

“Yeah, Zoro,” Chopper said, smiling along with that dumb moron, “You should go with him. Make sure he goes.” 

 

“I don’t need someone to go with me!” Sanji shouted, hands balling into fists. 

 

“You do,” Zoro said. “You won’t go otherwise.” 

 

 “You don’t know that! I’ll go!” 

 

“I _do_ know that. You’re not going unless someone physically makes you. And I have the rest of the day off. You should _appreciate_ how much your roommates care about you.” Zoro was saying all this shit with that smug look on his face and yeah, Sanji was probably going to fucking fight him. 

 

Chopper put a hand on Sanji’s shoulder, and Sanji whipped around to glare at him, because this was Chopper’s fault as much as Zoro’s. Maybe it wasn’t their fault that he was sick, but. It was still their fault. 

 

“Please go, Sanji. I’m serious.” 

 

Mother. Fucker. 

 

The look Chopper was giving Sanji was fucking horseshit, and Sanji wasn’t going to win this battle, was he. Chopper’s eyes were so big and pathetic. His concern was so _genuine._ Sanji was going to cook Chopper whatever he wanted for a week, but in that moment, he wanted to drop kick him out the window. 

 

“Fine! Fine, alright, I’m going. Zoro, get your coat. We’re leaving right now or I’m going to set this house on fire.” 

 

Zoro laughed and said, “It’s not the Sunny’s fault you got pneumonia,” and Chopper looked relieved and Sanji broke away from both of them, physically pushing past Zoro, and he went to find his coat that he’d dropped somewhere in the big living room because he needed to get away immediately. 

 

This was the worst thing that could possibly happen to him. 

 

A minute later, Sanji stood by the front door with his hands jammed in his jacket pockets, waiting on Zoro. 

 

“Are you com—“ Sanji tried to shout, but the whole yelling thing didn’t work well with his throat, his vocal cords were fucking betraying him, and he hunched over and coughed hard into his fist. 

 

“Yeah, don’t bust a lung,” Zoro said as he jogged down the stairs, yanking on his coat, and Sanji turned and walked out the front door, hardly waiting for him. 

 

Zoro caught up as Sanji was popping a cigarette into his mouth, now that they were outside and away from Chopper, and the smoke paired with the cold air burned like hell. It felt like he’d massaged the inside of his throat with a cheese grater. 

 

“Pretty fucking pathetic,” Zoro said to Sanji as he kept up with his brisk walk. 

 

“I need one right now,” Sanji said roughly, looking straight ahead. The bus stop wasn’t far. 

 

“You don’t _need_ it.” 

 

“ _Yes_. I fucking do.” Sanji glanced to his left, and Zoro was giving him the most motherfucking disdainful look. 

 

That stupid asshole. Of course Sanji needed one. They’d be at the bus stop in a couple minutes, and the bus would be there probably before too long, and Sanji couldn’t smoke on the bus, or in the doctor’s office, so he needed as many as possible _now_ and holy fuck, even the _thought_ of the goddamn bus ride—Sanji took a long drag on his cigarette and, fuck, it was too much, and he started hacking, slowing and eventually pausing his stride entirely. 

 

Zoro looked back at him and waited. 

 

Sanji spat a mouthful of phlegm onto the sidewalk and straightened up, catching up to Zoro, saying nothing. Thankfully, Zoro kept his snide comments to himself for the time being. 

 

Zoro wouldn’t understand the desperate need Sanji felt. Nicotine was his crutch, and his cushion, his goddamn safety blanket, and cigarettes were his vice and his first love and his fucking armor, and they’d probably kill him one day, but he was fucking addicted, and Zoro would never understand something like that, so fuck him. 

 

But then again, Zoro was an alcoholic at age twenty-two, so maybe he would. 

 

It wasn’t worth discussing.  

 

They stood next to each other at the bus stop, and Sanji was mentally willing himself to stop shivering. 

 

“So when did you move here? Like, to America.” 

 

Sanji raised his eyebrows and looked over at Zoro. And then he narrowed his eyes at him and croaked, “Why the fuck do you care.” 

 

“Passing the time.” 

 

That was another infuriating thing about Zoro. He’d been… less horrible lately. Almost like he was a decent human being capable of semi-complex thought. And now he was making _small talk with him._

 

“I don’t remember. I was nine, maybe. Or eight. Ten. I don’t know,” Sanji said, watching down the street for the bus. 

 

“What’s France like?” 

 

“Google it.” 

 

“Fuck you.” 

 

Sanji wanted another cigarette. He looked Zoro up and down. “Why do you dye your hair fucking green?” 

 

Zoro shrugged, like he didn’t even know the fucking answer, and that made Sanji angrier than anything Zoro had said to him in the past hour. 

 

Sanji could hear the big diesel engine of the bus rolling down the street, and he said to Zoro while watching for it, “You should go home. The bus is here, I’m getting on it, so you can go fuck off.” 

 

“You won’t go.” 

 

Sanji turned and gave Zoro a nasty look. “Stop fucking acting like you know jack shit about me.” 

 

Zoro gave him this stupid fucking serious face and folded his arms across his chest. “You swear on whatever the hell you find important that you’ll go to the doctor if I don’t get on the bus with you? You _swear_ it?” He was looking Sanji straight in the eye, and it was uncomfortable as hell. 

 

Sanji knew in his heart he wouldn’t go. He would avoid it until it killed him. He hated doctors, he hated thinking about health, he hated all of it, and if he got on the bus by himself, he knew he’d go straight to a bar—a bar far away from any medical clinic. And he would stay there until it closed.

 

Sanji clenched his jaw and said nothing, and when the bus stopped in front of them, Zoro followed Sanji onto it. 

 

The whole experience was more or less awful. 

 

The bus ride was too short, and the wait at the clinic was way too fucking long, and he basically repeated what he’d gone through with Chopper and then some, and yes, they’d written him up for an x-ray and scheduled it for that afternoon, which he also tried to skip, but Zoro was... being such a fucking asshole. 

 

Sanji didn't want to go to the fucking hospital.

 

Sanji had never been in a hospital before. Zoro stayed right next to him the entire time, making snide comments and saying little things that he fucking knew would piss Sanji off, and Sanji had been so distracted by trying to explain to Zoro what a fucking moron he was, that he was almost startled when a nurse called his name.

 

Shit. 

 

He would never tell Zoro that he’d nearly had some kind of freak-out panic attack meltdown once the machine started doing its x-ray thing. 

Sanji managed to remain still for the duration of the x-ray itself, but at soon as it was over, fuck. He’d yanked the heavy... blanket-shirt thing they made him wear off in such a hurry, getting his shit together and straightening out his clothes, and he’d bolted from the room before anyone could try to show him anything or tell him anything, and when he found the front desk to the particular lobby where he’d left Zoro, he’d stared at the nurse or receptionist or _whatever_ with huge eyes and taken a deep breath. 

 

“Do I need to check out? Or pay anything? Or—what do I do—can I go? Can I leave?” 

 

The lady in scrubs had smiled a little at him and said, “We’ll bill you, and your physician will contact you with the results.” 

 

“So I can go?” 

 

“You sure can.” Again with that smile, don’t smile at him like that, don’t fucking _look at him—_

 

Sanji turned and jammed his hands in his pockets and power-walked the fuck out of that building as fast as he could. He had to stop himself from breaking out into a full sprint. 

 

Once he was outside, and the cold air was hitting him in the face, like he was being backhanded, he took another long, deep breath and wound up coughing for nearly a full minute, and it was so rough that he was almost gagging. He was trying to light a cigarette when Zoro found him. 

 

Zoro stood next to Sanji while he turned and hunched over, cupping his hand around his cigarette, trying to create a barrier against the wind.

 

When he finally managed to get it lit, and took the longest drag his shitty throat would allow, Zoro said, “You did it,” and Sanji didn’t respond to that one. 

 

Zoro stayed next to him the entire way home, from the concrete steps of the big non-emergency entrance of the hospital to the front door of the Thousand Sunny. 

 

They bickered, and maybe laughed a little, and shared long stretches of silence, and the entire time, Sanji kept thinking to himself that he needed to stay away from Zoro. 

 

It was easier to hate him. 

 

 

* * *

 

“When is Nami coming back in town?” Sanji asked.

 

Usopp sat at the kitchen counter/bar and watched Sanji put together the fanciest sandwiches he’d seen in a while. He cleared his throat. “Thanksgiving. During the afternoon, I think? I’unno.” 

 

Nami had been gone the past couple days, visiting her sister back in her hometown. Usopp hadn’t talked to her since she’d left, which was weird, not talking to her, but he was pretty sure she’d said she was coming back on Thanksgiving, which was the day after tomorrow. 

 

Sanji hummed and nodded and sliced the sandwiches into little squares, which was silly because Usopp was just going to shove them all in his mouth as fast as he could because they looked so good, wow. Usopp really loved when Sanji was home, because he wasn’t home all that much, but when he was, he usually cooked. Like, he was happy to cook for everyone. It was the _best_.

 

Everyone had worked out a system where they each just gave Sanji money every month for groceries, and he took care of the rest. He made so many meals, and he would even prepare stuff that they could heat up later, like if he wouldn’t be around, and god, Usopp felt like he was living like a king most of the time just based on his standard diet. He’d never eaten this well in his life.

 

“Why do you ask?” Usopp wondered aloud as he absently popped all the knuckles on his left hand.

 

“We’ll all be here on Thanksgiving,” Sanji said as he walked over with two plates full of pretty little sandwiches and slid one in front of Usopp. He walked to the other side of the bar and sat next to Usopp and pulled his phone from his pocket, opening up the calendar on it, and Usopp leaned over to look at Sanji’s schedule. 

 

“You work a lot,” Usopp said with his mouth full. 

 

“I know,” Sanji said, looking down at his phone, “but we’re closed on Thanksgiving. I think we’re all going to be here that night.” 

 

“Yeah?” 

 

“Yeah. So,” Sanji looked up at his own portion of the lunch he’d prepared, and Usopp didn’t know how he had so much self control. Sanji was such a slow eater, whereas Usopp was almost halfway finished. “I can make Thanksgiving dinner for us.” 

 

“Really?” 

 

“Yes,” Sanji said, and he looked over at Usopp, grinning. “I can make the best Thanksgiving dinner any of us has ever had.” 

 

“Oh, _awesome_. Will it be like a French-Thanksgiving?” 

 

“That doesn’t make any fucking sense.” 

 

Usopp paused. “Either way, Sanji, I don’t have any extra money to give you. Turkeys are expensive, aren’t they? I’m, like, strapped for cash.”  

 

Sanji popped one of his little sandwiches into his mouth and shook his head. “Mm—no, don’t worry about it. It’s fine, I’ll cover it. I just dropped a couple hundred dollars on a fucking cough, I don’t care if I spend a little more on making dinner for my friends.” 

 

“You sound a lot better, by the way,” Usopp pointed out. Sanji had finally stopped coughing his lungs out every two seconds. He was more or less back to normal in just a few days. 

 

“Yeah, the medicine fixed me, like, immediately. I only took it for two days and I’m cured.” 

 

“You’re supposed to take the whole bottle—you know that, right?” Usopp asked, finishing off the last of his sandwiches. 

 

“Well, I’m all better, and I figured I could just save the bottle in case I ever got sick like that again, because those pills were fucking expensive. Also, they made my mouth taste like, uh… like metal. Metallic. It was fucking awful.” 

 

Usopp gave Sanji a look. “If you don’t take all of them, you can get it again and it’ll be worse and harder to cure.” 

 

Sanji shrugged. “Whatever.” 

 

“You’re an idiot.” 

 

“An idiot who’s making you a fucking nice French-Thanksgiving dinner, so fuck off. Text everyone. Make sure they’re all here that night.” Sanji slid his plate to Usopp, giving up what was left on it. “Tell the landlord, too. He’s also invited.”

 

Usopp gave Sanji a thumbs-up and inhaled his remaining sandwiches as he scrolled his contacts in his phone. 

 

It really was surprising that they’d all be there on Thanksgiving night. None of them had family in town. Usopp was the closest one to being a local out of any of them—he’d grown up in the city about an hour south of the college town they all lived in. 

 

Nami had gone to see her sister early because of her sister’s scheduling or something. Usopp couldn’t remember. But out of all of them, Nami was the only one to leave for the holiday. The rest of them couldn’t afford it or didn’t have family to go visit. 

 

Usopp had been there when Sanji had asked Luffy if he was going to go see his grandpa for Thanksgiving, and Luffy had just laughed and said, “Probably not.” 

 

Thanksgiving arrived quickly, and all day, the house smelled incredible. 

 

Usopp had texted Nami, offering to pick her up from the train station, but she’d declined, which was fucking weird as hell, but he hadn’t pushed it. When she arrived home, he’d been sitting on the couch, and he’d smiled when she walked in the door. 

 

Sanji had spun from his spot in front of the stove, shouting his greetings, and that he’d missed her, and that he was glad she arrived safely, and that dinner would be ready in a few hours, and—

 

“Hey,” she’d said to Usopp with a smile that was totally fucking fake. And then she’d waved to Sanji and gone up to her room, shouldering her single bag that she’d taken with her. 

 

Usopp watched her go and looked back at Sanji. Sanji’s eyes were already on Usopp. 

 

“That was weird, right?” Usopp asked, and Sanji nodded. 

 

“Go talk to her or something.” 

 

“Nah,” Usopp said, turning back to the television and the random alien documentary he’d put on. “She’ll talk about it if she wants to. She’s probably just tired from riding on trains and busses all day.” 

 

Sanji went back to making the best meal Usopp had ever smelled. “You’re probably right.” 

 

The dinner itself was absolutely _incredible_. 

 

Usopp had never seen one man orchestrate a kitchen like Sanji had been doing all day, making everything from scratch, talking through his thought process half the time—he was making up a lot of the recipes on the spot as he went along. Usopp listened to him talking to himself here and there, smoking like a chimney and humming every once in a while, for a good part of the morning and into the afternoon. 

 

Usopp had woken up fairly early and had no commitments for the day, so he’d offered to help Sanji with the cooking and had been refused immediately. 

 

A while back, Sanji had once explained to Usopp that he enjoyed experimenting when he cooked, and trying new things, and how his job prevented him from doing that. So that was part of why he cooked so often, even when he spent the entire day working his ass off in a kitchen. And from what Usopp understood, Sanji had been experimenting and preparing their extravagant Thanksgiving meal since the break of dawn. 

 

And when Sanji was finally finished, Usopp wanted to cry. He might’ve teared up just a tiny bit. He wanted to photograph it. 

 

The entire counter/bar was covered with huge plates of food, and Sanji had filled the rest of the counters with steaming hot plates of things Usopp had never seen, and it looked like art, and Usopp had stood up from the couch and walked over and stared at the display with his mouth hanging open. 

 

“Sanji, you’re like some kind of food-magician. This is insane. This is like… like if I won the food lottery. I don’t know how you do this, man,” Usopp started saying, and Sanji stood next to him and put a hand on his shoulder. 

 

“Usopp. You can build _robots_ and you’re impressed by a few hot meals.” Sanji was smiling at him. 

 

“You can’t eat a robot,” Usopp pointed out. 

 

“Fair enough. Where is everyone?” Sanji asked, looking over his shoulder at the giant empty room. 

 

“Nami and Zoro are both upstairs,” Usopp informed him, eyeing the super amazing-looking Thanksgiving meal in front of him, trying to keep all the spit in his mouth, but his mouth was watering _really hard_ and yeah, whoops, he might start straight up drooling _._ “And, uh, the others—they’ll be here soon.” 

 

“Will you go get them? Nami and the idiot?” 

 

“Sure.” 

 

Usopp knocked really hard on Zoro’s door because he was probably sleeping, but maybe he wasn’t, and Usopp sure as hell wasn’t going to just barge into Zoro’s room without giving him some warning because who knew, maybe Zoro was doing some crazy... muscle-training thing, and if Usopp just popped in there, Zoro might punch him in the face or something. 

 

He probably wouldn’t, but. Still. Zoro could knock Usopp into last week if he wanted. 

 

So Usopp knocked on the door until he heard Zoro grunt from inside his room. Poking his head in the room, Usopp said, “Hey, the best meal of our young adult lives awaits us.” 

 

Zoro had obviously been passed out all day. He threw the covers off himself and grunted again and Usopp took that as confirmation that he’d received the message. 

 

Usopp just walked into Nami’s room simply because he hadn’t knocked on her door in, like, two months. 

 

He found her sitting on her bed with her legs crossed and her eyes glued to the screen on her laptop. She looked up at him and snapped her computer closed. 

 

“Food’s ready,” he said to her with a smile. 

 

“Alright. I’ll be down in a few minutes,” she said, opening her computer again, turning her attention back to it. 

 

“Nami.”

 

“Hm?” 

 

“It’s ready right now, we can actually go and eat it _right now_.” 

 

“I said I’ll be down in a minute!” 

 

Usopp folded his arms over his chest. “ _Nami._ ”

 

“ _What!_ ” 

 

“Let’s go get really fat together.” 

 

Nami sighed and closed her computer again and stood up, smiling at him just a little, and she said, “Fine, fine. It does smell really good. Let’s go make ourselves physically ill.” 

 

Usopp grinned and linked his arm around hers and pulled her from her room. 

 

A couple minutes later, Chopper and Luffy walked in the door looking wind-blown, and Chopper looked a little frazzled as opposed to Luffy’s expression. Luffy walked to the kitchen, silent for once, and looked upon the huge display Sanji had waiting for him. Usopp thought Luffy looked like he was falling deeply in love and experiencing the emotion for the very first time as he stared at all the food. 

 

“Do you think one turkey is enough?” Luffy asked, his voice almost a little shaky. 

 

Sanji stood behind him. “That bird weighs half as much as you do.” 

 

“I just—“ 

 

“You can have as much as you want,” Sanji said, cutting him off. 

 

Luffy inhaled deeply, like his voice was caught in his throat, and Sanji handed him a really big plate and Luffy took it like it was a precious gift. And then, almost like a whirlwind, Luffy started piling as much food as he could fit onto his plate. He made layers of side dishes. He paused in front of the expertly-carved turkey. 

 

“You want light or dark meat?” Sanji asked. 

 

“I want…” Luffy said slowly, and he reached over and pulled an entire leg off the bird, like the whole fucking drum, and put it on top of the mountain on his plate. “This.” 

 

Sanji snorted and turned away from him, and Nami was walking around the kitchen with Chopper, looking at everything, and there were so many options that if Nami just took one bite of every single thing, it’d probably fill her up. This was a difficult decision for all of them except Luffy, who could fit an extremely unnatural amount of food into his scrawny little body. 

 

Usopp and Chopper stood next to Nami, and the three of them pointed at different things and asked Sanji, “What’s that?” 

 

“Port-roasted chestnuts with grapes.” 

 

“And that?” 

 

“Potato gratin with porcini mushrooms and mascarpone cheese.” 

 

“This stuff?” 

 

“Sautéed parsnips and carrots with honey and rosemary.” 

 

“Those?” 

 

“Balsamic-braised cipolline onions with pomegranate.” 

 

Usopp didn’t know what the hell any of that was, and there were so many more dishes, fuck, and Sanji seemed to sense this from him and leaned over a little to say, “All of it’s good, just pick anything, you’ll like it.” 

 

Luffy made some kind of affirmative noise from the cherrywood dining table. He was already shoveling food into his mouth at an extreme rate. So much for waiting for everyone. 

 

Zoro came downstairs just as Usopp and Nami and Chopper were sitting down at the table, and Sanji didn’t hang around to explain to Zoro what everything was. He waited, standing off to the side and smoking a cigarette, watching the rest of his roommates and smiling a little. 

 

It was apparent that Sanji cooked not because he liked eating, but because he liked feeding people. Loved it, even. 

 

Brook burst in the door carrying several bottles of liquor, apologizing for being a little late, and Sanji grinned when he saw him and what he’d brought. 

 

It was very old and fancy liquor, according to Sanji and Zoro. 

 

Usopp saw Sanji kind of roll his eyes a little when Zoro recognized the gifts Brook had brought them. 

 

Once Brook had filled his plate and was seated, Sanji finally picked out a few dishes for himself and sat at the end of the table. 

 

The whole table manners thing wasn’t very important at the Thousand Sunny, seemingly. Luffy ate like a damn slob. The rest of them weren’t _much_ better. Nami and Brook and Sanji were the only ones with some semblance of restraint. 

 

“Do you like it?” Sanji asked Nami, who sat between him and Usopp. 

 

“It’s incredible, Sanji,” she said with another smile. A fake smile. Usopp recognized it. Sanji probably did too. But he looked like he was melting, regardless. He put on the act with no hesitation. 

 

“Are we going to go around the table and list things we’re grateful for?” Usopp asked, clearly joking in between stuffing his face and gulping down a glass of one of the bottles of wine Sanji had left out, and he got a kinda-nasty look from Sanji for drinking wine like that, but whatever. 

 

“Is that what people do?” Sanji asked, picking through his plate. 

 

“No idea,” Luffy said with a full mouth. “This is the first big family Thanksgiving I’ve ever been to.” 

 

Chopper swallowed what was in his mouth, taking a deep breath, reaching for a glass of wine and wrinkling his nose at the taste of it. “I’ve always had very small Thanksgiving meals with my grandmother and sometimes our neighbor—we didn’t really have traditions.” 

 

“Same here,” Nami said quietly. 

 

“I’m just assuming that’s what people do. It is, isn’t it?” Usopp asked, suddenly wondering if big families actually did go around the table and say what they were thankful for on Thanksgiving, or if that was all made up or exaggerated. 

 

“Sounds pretty stupid to me, if it’s true,” Zoro said, eating almost as quickly as Luffy. 

 

Usopp paused and looked at all of them, and he saw Luffy glance up and sweep his eyes along the table filled with the feasting tenants of the Thousand Sunny. He knew Luffy was thinking the same thing he was. 

 

For the first time, they found something that the six of them all had in common. 

 

“I have to tell you all,” Brook spoke up, and his plate was already almost empty, wow. “This is the first family dinner I’ve been to in perhaps fifty years, so I wanted you to know how grateful I am to be included here.” 

 

Brook grinned at all of them, and Luffy was suddenly smiling back, smiling really hard, and he laughed—they laughed together, and they toasted their glasses of wine.

 

Usopp kind of assumed that Brook was joking. But then again, maybe he wasn’t. Maybe he really was, like, a hundred years old. 

 

Everyone ate until they were sick and could hardly move. They all had to sort of combine their efforts to get Luffy to stop going back for thirds and fourths and fifths, because if he kept eating, he was going to end up having to go to the hospital or something. And then Sanji had pulled out the desserts and what the _hell_.  


The evening wound down with everyone collapsing on the couches and the loveseat and the floor in the living room area, and Luffy put on a DVD that none of them had seen yet, and Brook rolled a joint and god, Usopp had maybe never felt the way he felt at the moment. With all of them together like that. It was just…

 

He looked over at Nami and frowned. She was right next to him on the couch, and she watched the documentary along with everyone else, but if felt like she wasn’t really all there. She was too quiet.

 

They sat shoulder to shoulder, as they often did, but it felt weird. Or different. Or something.

 

It was much later on in the evening, after almost everyone had passed out watching Luffy’s DVD with overly full bellies and Usopp had gone upstairs, when Nami walked into his bedroom with her laptop tucked under her arm. Usopp sat up from where he was sprawled across his bed, stifling a yawn. It had been hard to not take a really intense nap after eating such an incredible meal.

 

“I was wondering when you’d stop by,” Usopp said, stretching, and he moved to the side because he just assumed Nami would throw herself down onto the bed next to him, as per usual.

 

Instead, she set herself on the floor. She laid on her stomach, her weight on her elbows, and she opened her laptop so the screen was facing away from him. That was a little weird, but. Well, whatever.

 

After she didn't say anything for a few minutes, he sat up a little bit. “Um. So, how was your trip?”

 

“It was fine,” Nami replied, not even looking at him.

 

“That’s… good,” Usopp said slowly, watching her. “You got to spend some time with your sister?”

 

“Yep.”

 

“That must’ve been nice. You guys have a, uh… what, an orchard?” Usopp scratched the back of his head.

 

“Yeah.”

 

“And you grew up there?”

 

“Sure did.”

 

“Man, I bet that was pretty awesome.”

 

Nami nodded slowly, reading something that must’ve been _extremely_ interesting on her laptop because Usopp knew what the hell it felt like to be ignored.

 

And, yeah, this was weird. He stared at her for several long seconds.

 

“Nami, what's going on?”

 

“Not much,” she responded, ignoring the implication in his question. Then she pursed her lips into a thin line, and the look she gave him was a little cold. “Am I bothering you?”

 

“No,” Usopp said reflexively, but then he thought it over for a moment. He wasn't sure if he'd ever seen her look at him like that before, and this was definitely weird. Uncomfortably weird. “It _is_ bothering me that you're not telling me what's wrong with you,” he finally added.

 

“Nothing’s wrong with me!” Nami returned, like she was offended, and Usopp had to stop himself from rolling his eyes.

 

“You haven’t smiled since you’ve been home, not _really_ , and you look like you want to punch a hole in the wall, and you’ve hardly said a word to me—“

 

“Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t know I needed to _check in_ when I got home.”

 

“The hell, that's not what I said. I'm just weirded out that you're acting so bizarre.”

 

“I'm being bizarre? You're the one who's trying to pry into my personal business.”

 

Whoa. Okay. This was a pretty bad direction to head in. He backpedaled, tried rephrasing his question, his concern, but things continued to escalate.

 

“Nami, we talk about shit like this all the time.”

 

“We _talk._ I don't grill you with personal questions about shit you obviously don't want to talk about, and here you are trying to get me to do just that. My family, my family's farm, and what happened on my trip is none of your business.”

 

Usopp frowned at her, as she glared up at him from the floor. She was right, her family wasn’t any of his business. But she was his friend, probably his closest friend, and it _was_ his business if something was going on with her.

 

But it was like there was nothing he could say that would turn out right.

 

“I'm just _worried_ , Nami,” he said finally. “Something obviously happened.”

 

“Even if it did, it's none of your fucking business,” she repeated for probably the fourth time.

 

Usopp snapped a bit. “I don't even know what to say to you when you're being such a… a—“

 

He wasn't even totally sure what he was about to say, but Nami cut him off before he could finish it, rising to her feet as she spoke.

 

“A what, Usopp? A jerk? A _bitch_?”

 

Usopp looked up at her up at her and her angry face and clenched fists and he didn’t know what the fuck was suddenly happening.

 

“Why the hell are you trying to pick a fight with me?” he asked, barely able to keep his tone steady.

 

“You're the one who was about to call me a bitch.”

 

“I wasn't going to call you a bitch,” he said, a little loudly, and he really wished there was something he could say to diffuse this situation but he was pretty sure he was just making things even worse.

 

“Well, _I_ ’ _m_ not picking a fight with you,” she sniffed, looking down at her computer on the floor. “I just came in here for a minute to relax and unwind and you’re already prying into things about me and my family, and you should just mind your own business and focus on your own life and your own—“

 

Nami suddenly stopped, her voice faltering over the last word, but it was pretty easy to tell what she was about to say.

 

“You’re the closest thing to family I have.”

 

Usopp sure as hell hadn’t meant to say that, it’d kind of slipped out, but it was too late to do anything about it now.

 

Nami frowned and after several tense seconds, eventually let the breath out of her lungs.

 

“Usopp, I—sorry, I wasn't thinking, but—“

 

“Sorry, I didn’t mean—I just—you’re one of my closest friends. So I care if you leave for a few days and come back all stressed out. Or not stressed out. Or whatever.”

 

Nami looked up at him and forced one of her smiles, and he didn’t smile back.

 

“Nothing’s wrong. I’m just… yeah, I’m stressed over some things. But it’s not a big deal. Don’t worry about it, I’ll get over it.”

 

“Okay, I won't pry. But you know, if you need to talk, or anything—“

 

"I know that," she replied, almost cutting him off, and there was obviously a lot of finality there, like he wasn't really welcome to say much else. 

 

And then she said, a little softer, "But—thanks. I'll keep that in mind."

 

 

* * *

 

November had passed by before he really knew it. Shit. 

 

Zoro glanced over at the digital clock on his nightstand when he heard the front door slam shut from downstairs. It was three in the morning.

 

He was sitting at his desk, hunched over it with three empty beer cans next to his textbook because his trashcan was full and overflowing from the past few days and he couldn’t be hassled to deal with it. He didn’t know why he was bothering with this shit now, anyway—the whole studying thing. It was pointless this late at night. But he’d been awake, and he’d been fucking dwelling on school, and sitting around twiddling his thumbs and feeling bad sure as hell wasn’t going to do jack shit.

 

“ _Jesus, fuck!_ ”

 

Zoro closed his eyes. Sanji’s voice was so easily recognizable, even if he didn't have the ridiculous accent.The outburst in the stairwell was followed immediately with some knocking around and bumping into the walls and Zoro didn’t need to actually see Sanji to know he’d tripped up on the stairs in his stupidass oxfords with the slick bottoms and had lurched wildly for the railing. Zoro could literally hear every step of Sanji’s struggle in detail.

 

Zoro was not prepared at all for Sanji to suddenly burst into his room, though, like a drunken whirlwind. An inebriated force of nature.

 

With his hand still on the doorknob, Sanji squinted at Zoro in the overhead light of his bedroom.

 

“Why’re you in my room? What are you doing?” Sanji asked, gripping the handle of the door harder, leaning a little, stumbling just a bit when the door continued to slowly swing open on its set trajectory.

 

“This is my room, you stupid dipshit,” Zoro corrected him, pushing his chair away from the desk a bit, facing Sanji a little more. He couldn’t decide whether to be pissed or just amused. On one hand, his stupid idiot roommate had interrupted his attempt at studying. But on the other, this was fucking pathetic.

 

Sanji looked genuinely confused, and Zoro watched him really _try_ to open his eyes wider, and he actually couldn’t, and he looked around the room, his eyebrows pursed together.

 

Sanji turned on his heel and walked into the room directly across the hall and flipped on the bedroom lights—as in, his _own_ bedroom lights—and a second later, Zoro heard him burst out laughing, like from his gut, and Zoro curled his lips inwards and bit them. He leaned in his chair enough so that it rocked back on two legs, and he said in the loudest hushed voice he could manage, “You’re gonna wake everyone up, asshole.”

 

“I give a shit!” Sanji yelled back, and then he clapped a hand over his mouth, groaning. He crossed the hall again, forgetting to turn his goddamn bedroom light back off, and he returned to Zoro’s room like that’d been his planned destination the entire fucking time, hand still over his stupid mouth, saying something about, “Fuck, I forgot about Nami, fuck, I _am_ an asshole, oh my god, oh fuck me.”

 

Sanji slammed Zoro’s door shut behind him and immediately winced, turning around and gently pressing his fingertips against the imitation wood. “Whoops.”

 

“You’re a fucking idiot,” Zoro said from his chair, and Sanji whipped around, wobbling a little.

 

“I am, you’re right,” he said, his eyes finally starting to adjust to the light. They were bloodshot as all hell.

 

Zoro honestly didn’t know how to respond to Sanji agreeing with him. He didn’t know how to respond to this situation in general. Sanji had only been in his room on a couple occasions, and it was for seconds at a time. And now he was leaning against the closed door, his hair a fucking mess, long fingers with red knuckles curled around the edges of his jacket sleeves. Zoro changed the subject.

 

“You couldn’t even make it to the right bedroom; how the fuck did you manage to get home on your own?”

 

Sanji rubbed his eyes and mumbled something. Something totally incoherent with a thick accent that Zoro wouldn’t have been able to understand either way. And then Sanji blinked several times, forcing his eyes to refocus on Zoro. “I don’t know? That’s… I do not know how I got here.”

 

Zoro had never seen Sanji this drunk.

 

“You sound like a fucking idiot.”

 

Sanji wrinkled his nose at Zoro. “Well. I hate you.”  He put his hands in his pockets and walked up to Zoro’s desk, leaning over him to inspect his work, completely ignoring any personal space Zoro had designated for himself. “And you’re too stupid to figure out this basic shit, don’t fucking call me an idiot.” 

 

Zoro debated whether or not to hit Sanji. He should probably hit him. He should hit him fucking hard right in his stupid fucking mouth that never shut the fuck up. But that would cause a lot of noise. If everyone else in that house had managed, somehow, to sleep through Sanji’s hammered-as-fuck homecoming, Zoro doubted they’d sleep through the fight he wanted _very badly_ to get into with his piece of shit roommate after that snide fucking comment he just made.

 

This version of Sanji was colder than he was used to. This version came with a different sort of bite. And if Zoro had any extremely brief hesitations over whether or not Sanji was an asshole to his core, they were gone now. Fuck that stupid prick.

 

“Idiot’s a little weak,” Zoro said, and Sanji straightened up a little, looking down his nose at Zoro as he continued, “You’re not even an idiot. You’re a scum-sucking womanizer who thinks his shit doesn’t stink, and right now, you’re being a fucking nuisance.”

 

Sanji said nothing. He just stood there. Zoro was on edge, ready for Sanji to try something stupid. But instead, after a long sigh, Sanji pushed the empty beer cans aside and sat on Zoro’s desk.

 

“I see your point,” he said, and Zoro literally did not have a comeback for that. After a moment’s pause, he met Zoro’s eyes and nodded towards what was left of Zoro’s twelve-pack. “Can I have one?”

 

“They’re warm.”

 

“I don’t give a shit.”

 

Zoro didn’t say yes. He didn’t mean to communicate that Sanji was welcome to one of his beers. But. Well. Sanji was leaning over the desk, his half-untucked button-up shirt riding up his waist a little, and Zoro looked away.

 

“Go drink that in your own room. I’m going to pass out. It’s late.” Zoro stood and stretched, looking over at his bedroom door.

 

“I can’t sleep yet,” Sanji said, cracking the beer open and putting the sole of one shoe against the corner of Zoro’s freshly empty chair.

 

“Is that supposed to matter to me?”

 

Sanji’s head was dipped down, the can of beer resting on a bent knee, keeping it balanced with the tips of his fingers. “I’m too drunk.”

 

“That’s your own stupid fault,” Zoro said, standing in the middle of his room, not knowing where to go now. “Go cook something. Or go throw up on yourself, I don’t care. Just—“

 

“Oh, fuck off, I’m drinking this beer and—it’s fucking gross, by the way—I’m smoking a cigarette and maybe passing out, stop crying.”

 

“I’m not crying, you stupid fuck.”

 

“Oh, sorry, it just sounded like a grown man was crying just now. Sounds like you’re crying. Pretty sure you’re crying.”

 

Zoro glared at Sanji until he suddenly looked up at him, smiling, and what the fuck, Sanji was fucking _joking around with him_ and, and, damn it, Zoro just really needed Sanji’s stupid drunk ass out of his room immediately.

 

Sanji was far too unpredictable like this.

 

Leaning to his side, Sanji dug in his pants pocket and produced a half-crumbled pack of cigarettes, and he held it out to Zoro with his ugly crooked smile. “You want one?”

 

Zoro didn’t know if Sanji was still joking around or not.

 

“I value my lungs.”

 

Sanji flipped open the top and pulled a single cigarette from the white and copper pack. “But they make you look so _cool._ ”

 

“You’re really the biggest idiot I’ve ever met.”

 

Sanji popped the cigarette between his lips and started checking his other pockets, presumably for a lighter.

 

“Don’t smoke that in here.”

 

Sanji found his lighter and lit his cigarette.

 

“It’s too late in the night for me to kick your ass right now, dick,” Zoro said tightly, folding his arms across his chest, but Sanji had already busied himself with looking around Zoro’s room.

 

That stupid asshole. Zoro walked to one of the two windows in his room and pulled it open with one hand, keeping an eye on Sanji, who was slowly wavering in his seat on Zoro’s desk. He had one of Zoro’s notebooks, and he’d started sifting through it, reading over poorly-organized notes, his face completely impassive, cigarette resting just past the first two knuckles on his left hand.

 

“Maybe you’re more of a visual learner,” Sanji said, his words threading together, glancing at each page for only a few seconds, not really reading anything.

 

“What.” Zoro didn’t know what that stupid prick was talking about. The cold almost-winter wind blowing in from Zoro’s window was making the hair on his arms stand up.

 

“I mean…” Sanji trailed off, taking a long drag on his cigarette, puffing at it a few times to pull more smoke through the filter and into his lungs, like he couldn’t quite get enough with a single inhale. He took a deep breath, still half-reading, and he slowly exhaled a long, fat plume that didn’t really dissipate all the way and hung in a thin layer over most of Zoro’s room. That asshole was totally unconcerned with how much he was stinking up the place. He exhaled two more times, even more smoke slipping past his lips.

 

Zoro didn’t know how Sanji managed to ever breathe.

 

“I mean, this… economics and business shit is—it’s a lot of concepts that, you know, don’t have these nice mental pictures to go with them, so just, uh, listening to someone talk about it can be confusing. Pain in the ass. You know? Hard to grasp. For me, anyway. I mean, listen, I’m obviously much better at this than you, but maybe you could try some—“ Sanji cleared his throat, “—other ways of learning this shit.”

 

“What the fuck are you trying to say?” Zoro asked.

 

“Maybe I’ll help you study,” Sanji said, still looking at the notebook that curled inwards from Zoro rolling it up into a tight frustrated cylinder so many times.

 

Zoro bit the inside of his cheek, staring at Sanji from where he’d remained next to the window. He shivered a little from the bite of the wind. “I don’t want your help.”

 

“Yeah, well, you need it,” Sanji said, tossing the notebook aside, still not fucking looking at him, and he ashed his cigarette into the little trashcan next to Zoro’s desk. He reached for the warm beer he’d opened and brought it to his lips, sipping it with unfocused eyes.

 

Zoro leaned back against his wall, watching Sanji. He didn’t know what that stupid prick was doing in his room, drinking his beer, telling him that he’d help him fucking study—what the hell was wrong with him? Zoro narrowed his eyes, “There isn’t anything I’d ever need from someone like you.”

 

Sanji rolled his droopy, half-lidded eyes and turned his head to give Zoro the most painfully exasperated expression that he could manage, looking the way he did. The later in the night it got, and the more Sanji drank, the more he ended up looking like he got hit by a bus. This was one of those nights.

 

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” Zoro said, affronted by the look on Sanji's face.

 

“It means you’re an asshole, and I’m too drunk to play the game right now.”

 

Zoro’s eyebrows kneaded together. “What game? What the hell are you talking about?” Why the fuck couldn’t he just say anything like a normal person? Just goddamn spit it out?

 

“The game you and I play,” Sanji said, his voice a little lower, and he was looking right at Zoro, and it was a little unnerving.

 

No, it wasn’t unnerving. It was annoying. As hell.

 

“I still don’t know what you’re trying to say. I hate you, and you hate me, and that’s the end of it,” Zoro said, his voice dry.

 

“I don’t hate you. Well. I do. Okay, I do, yes, but not really—not actively, constantly, you know?”

 

Zoro shook his head. “No. I don’t know. I definitely hate you.”

 

“Well, fuck it, lighten up, I’m too fucked up for your bullshit tonight.” Sanji took another long drag of his cigarette, eyes on the ground again. He swung his dangling legs a little, his posture terrible, totally hunched over, one hand pressed against his thigh. Probably holding himself up, by the look of it.

 

Zoro walked over to the desk that Sanji was currently occupying and pulled one of the last beers from his twelve-pack and cracked it open. Gaze locked on the far wall, he said, “You really think you can help me with that statistics bullshit class.”

 

It wasn’t a question. Maybe an accusation.

 

Sanji looked up at him—Zoro could see him out of his peripheral, he felt the movement, and he met Sanji’s eyes.

 

“Yes.”

 

Fuck.

 

“Okay.” Zoro took several consecutive gulps from his warm beer, pulling the can from his mouth with a final swallow and a long sigh. “Okay.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you so much for reading chapter 4!! things have been a little hectic for both of us, but we shall continue to bust ass to bring you this giant beast of a fic, no worries~*~*~ anyway, now seems like a good time to announce that December will be coming to you in three separate parts. so the parts will be shorter, but the wait between release dates will also be shorter so booyah. and then that’ll be the end of part one of make no mistake! part two will begin with january, which, will be a hulking chapter so prepare yourselves for that
> 
> once again, thank you so friggin much for the reviews and the art and ALL the things. they really really fuel us and you don’t know what they mean to us. thank you. as always, you can reach us both at okama-kenpo (liz) and eudaimonarisornae (raquel) on tumblr, and if you post a thing for mnm, please tag it with #mnmfanfic so we can see it!!
> 
> we hope to see you in chapter 5, part 1: december !!!


	5. December (Part I)

Zoro jerked upright as a familiar fist pounded on his bedroom door.Shit, he'd been starting to doze off. 

 

“It's time to study, jackass,” came the loud, muffled voice.

 

“Yeah, okay,” Zoro called back, rubbing his eyes as Sanji sauntered in, a fresh cigarette between his lips.

 

Sanji looked like he hadn't slept for the last week or so.Really, that might've been accurate—Zoro had no idea when he could've slept, because every moment that idiot wasn't at work or school, it felt like he'd been riding his ass.Or cooking dinner.Or making Nami drinks.

 

But mostly, riding his ass—making him study, acting like his damn tutor.It annoyed him at first, but it was weird how quickly it became normal.

 

“Oh, you're already at it,” Sanji commented, pretending to be surprised—like he himself hadn't personally acknowledged how much Zoro studied in the past.Like they hadn't spent _way_ too much time doing this together lately.

 

“I don't need you babysitting me to do the shit I need to do.”

 

Sanji took a thoughtful drag.“True.But you can't make sense of it without me.”

 

Zoro had no reply to that. It was a weird comment—but he didn't have time to dwell on it. 

 

There were only four days left until finals week.Even with Sanji's involvement, he was still pretty convinced it was a lost cause. He wouldn't be able to pass most of his exams—and he definitely wouldn't pass anything if he failed the final.

 

Still, he was in better shape than he would have been.Sanji's dumb examples made more sense than the textbook and the lectures and the occasional study sessions with other classmates combined.But, it'd only been a little over a week that he'd been studying with Sanji.It was too little, too late.  

 

At around four in the morning, Sanji was trying to explain the difference between a stockholder and a stakeholder (and how sometimes a stakeholder was _also_ a stockholder, who the fuck came up with this shit), and he wasn't getting it.Tossing his pencil onto his desk, he leaned back in his chair, pressing the heels of his palms against his eyes.

 

“Too far past your bedtime, princess?” Sanji asked, his voice getting a little raw.He was probably on his twentieth cigarette of the evening.The later it got, the more Sanji chain-smoked—Zoro was getting used to the smell and being surrounded by secondhand smoke.

 

“There's no point doing this for me, so you might as well sleep.Or something.”Zoro glanced at the circles under Sanji's eyes, and maybe he actually felt a little bad. 

 

“The hell are you talking about?You can do this, if you're not half-assed about it.”

 

He didn't feel like he'd ever been half-assed about it—but that wasn't really the part that'd tripped him up.Sanji had replied reflexively, like he didn't even think about the situation.Zoro didn't know what to say, so he didn't speak. 

 

“You can do this,” Sanji repeated.“So come on, we're gonna go through these examples of stakeholder mapping, and you're going to get it if I need to fucking forcibly jam it into that thick skull of yours.”

 

Zoro rolled his eyes.But then he picked up his pencil, and they started again.But—he was a little affected.

 

He could do it, huh.

 

The words rolled around in his head over and over as Sanji drew a scary spider-web of an example for him—which actually maybe made sense, at least more sense than it did in the textbook—and Zoro kept thinking how weird it was.Weird that they were there, together.Weird that this was clicking a little bit.

 

And so fucking weird that Sanji was maybe the only person who'd ever actually said those words to him.  

 

The days slipped away too quickly.Zoro studied constantly, to the point he was having a hard time focusing on the words on the page.He'd spent so much time looking at too-small type and his own goddamn handwriting over the last several days that the act of reading was nauseating.And he was so damn tired—he was constantly fighting the urge to take a nap, because he couldn't afford to lose a couple hours.

 

He had to try, because maybe—maybe this wasn't totally fucking pointless.

 

Like he'd probably still fail a couple exams, but he could pass maybe half, if he was lucky.He also had to work an overnight shift that Tuesday—even though he had a 9:00 a.m. exam on Wednesday morning.Probably wouldn't be passing _that_ test.

 

He was lucky he only had that shift, though.Zoro's boss had goddamn laughed in his face when he said he needed four days off in a row in the middle of December—which Zoro thought was actually kind of fucked up, since his boss knew he was a student—but his job _was_ to restock aisles in a toy store and it was close to Christmas.One mid-week shift and then a bunch of double-shifts over the next weekend was the compromise for him getting so many days off. 

 

“You should just call in,” Sanji had told him, when his schedule'd first been released.“Even _I'm_ taking off exam week.”

 

“I'll get fired.”

 

“You'll probably get fired anyway, right?”

 

Sanji's expression was obnoxious but Zoro wasn't actually offended—he was probably right. And since Zoro really didn't _want_ to get fired, he'd work the shift. 

 

The one good thing about exam week was that he only had one exam per day, Monday through Thursday.In past years, they'd sometimes gotten doubled up on a day, which had never gone well for him.Actually, that didn't make a difference.They never went well for him, period. But maybe this time, though, things would be different.

 

Shit. Maybe Sanji's back-handed encouragement was actually having an effect on him.

 

And then, like he was fucking time-traveling, it was the night before his first exam.Sanji'd been working that night, but as soon as he got home, there was a familiar, obtrusive knock on Zoro's door.Sanji threw it open a moment later, a haggard mess of smoke and stale cologne, not bothering to wait for a reply. 

 

When the hell was Sanji going to study for his own exams, anyway?

 

It grew later and later, and Zoro's concerns came back with a vengeance.It didn't matter if Sanji thought he could do it—he was going to fail and he knew it.

 

“You should just go sleep or whatever.This is a waste of time.”

 

Sanji was angled back in his chair, ankle resting on his knee.He tilted his head at Zoro, only one narrowed eye visible through his messy mop of blond hair.He exhaled slowly, the smoke rolling out of his mouth looking more like water than air.

 

“That pisses me off, you know,” Sanji drawled.“That you're telling me I've been wasting my time these last couple of weeks.”

 

Zoro opened his mouth to retort, but he actually felt a little bit _bad._ It was clear that Sanji had spent maybe every waking moment helping him for the last two weeks, even though he always seemed stretched so thin already. He didn't know how the fuck to reply to Sanji's remark.He didn't really understand _why_ Sanji was doing it.  

 

Like he had many times before, he opened his mouth to ask.But once again, he couldn't bring himself to form the question—he wasn't sure why, but it was a difficult thing to ask.Maybe he just didn't know what he'd do if Sanji actually responded.  

 

It didn't make sense.

 

“What pisses me off even more,” Sanji continued, “is that you're just straight wrong.”

 

“Huh?”That weird confidence again—it threw him off-kilter.  

 

Leaning forward and ashing his cigarette into the nearby ashtray, Sanji still didn't break his gaze with Zoro.“This _is_ doing you some good.And you're going to pass these fucking tests.”

 

Zoro snorted.“Yeah, as long as it's not any questions about distribution justice.”

 

“It's distributive justice,” Sanji said through gritted teeth.

 

“Right.”

 

“I said you've got this, so just fucking have a little confidence or whatever.You sure as fuck don't have a problem with confidence in anything else.”  

 

Zoro wasn't sure what that meant.

 

By the crack of dawn, Zoro could hardly keep his eyes open.As his head started to droop downward, he felt something hard strike him in the ribs.

 

“Not bedtime yet, asshole,” Sanji said, hands shoved into his pockets.Had that bastard just kicked him?Well, it wasn't that hard, but he was sure as hell awake now—and _annoyed_.  

 

“Are you a goddamn child,” Zoro muttered under his breath. 

 

“Come on, let's go downstairs,” Sanji said, ignoring him and grabbing a stack of his books off the desk.

 

“Huh? Why?”

 

“For coffee.Breakfast.There's only a couple hours to go.”

 

“I hate coffee.”

 

“I bet coffee hates you, too.”

 

Zoro scowled at the dumb comment as he reluctantly followed him downstairs, and they dropped his stuff off on the counter/bar.Sanji set to work doing his cooking thing, grabbing shit out of the fridge and cupboards, and Zoro couldn't even tell what the hell he was trying to do.He threw a bunch of ingredients in a bowl and started mixing it, and as he worked, he started _quizzing_ Zoro. Like he was a grade-schooler learning his fucking times tables or something.

 

It was really fucking annoying.

 

Sanji never stopped moving, never faltered as he started to make an unexpectedly lavish breakfast.Zoro should've realized that was what he was doing, though—when Sanji cooked, he cooked for everyone.

 

The bowl of shit was apparently pancake batter, and after a little while, he had one of those flat grill-looking things—they were called skillets, maybe—and pans on all of the burners of the stove, making pancakes and bacon and sausage.And when the meats were done, he laid them out in dishes like a goddamn breakfast buffet, moving onto preparing eggs in, like, multiple ways, and cutting up fruit.Seriously?

 

And as he cooked, he never stopped quizzing him.Even as the rest of their roommates slowly started to make their way downstairs, lured by the smell of food, Sanji didn't let up.

“You're such a fucking overachiever,” Zoro muttered as Sanji finally took a seat next to him with only a modest portion of the feast he'd just cooked sitting on his plate.

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” Sanji asked, not really sounding particularly affected. He turned to give Zoro a look.“Actually, I don't care and you don't have time to explain that.Tell me what a subprime mortgage is.”

 

“Fuck,” Zoro muttered through a mouthful of scrambled eggs.“It's, uh, part of that mortgage crisis... thing.”

 

He rolled his eyes. “Yeah right, shithead.Try again.You know this.” 

 

That probably would've made him a little angrier a couple of months ago.But it was kind of barely an annoyance anymore—had less bite to it than it used to. They'd spent _a lot_ of time together lately.  

 

Besides—Sanji said he knew this. So maybe he did.

 

He wracked his brain and he actually _was_ able to answer the question and all of the follow-up questions about the Great Recession and the mortgage crisis and the liquidity crisis—seriously, why was everything a crisis, that was confusing—and even if sometimes it'd take a while before he came to the right conclusion, he realized that what Sanji had been doing with him was undeniablyhelping, for some reason.

 

Sanji was impatient and it sort of bled through into everything he did.Impatient as hell and yet he wasn't.  

 

Zoro still had no fucking clue why Sanji was doing all of this, which was starting to bother him more and more.But even not knowing the reason behind everything -- it didn't change the results, either way.

 

They walked to campus in tandem—something they'd done for the last few classes they had together, oddly enough—and Sanji still didn't let up playing the goddamn quizmaster.

 

They arrived early, and even though it was fucking freezing outside, Zoro sat down on a bench near the building entrance while Sanji blew through a final cigarette.

 

“You feeling ready?” Sanji asked, hugging his arms to himself, his teeth chattering.

 

Zoro forced a dry chuckle.“Not at all.”

 

“What the fuck kind of attitude is that.We've been going over this shit all night.”

 

“Yeah, well, I'm not good with tests.”

 

“No fucking kidding,” Sanji agreed.“But you know—you're into sports and shit.You've gotta, you know, visualize it.”

 

Zoro's eyebrows raised slightly.“Uh, what?”

 

“When you go to tournaments, competitions, whatever the hell—do you think, 'fuck me, I'm probably gonna lose'?”

 

“No.”  

 

“So you think you'll kick all of their asses, right?”

 

“Something like that,” Zoro said slowly.He wondered if Sanji actually knew what fencing even was.

 

“Right.You have to visualize yourself winning the medal.Trophy.Whatever.”Sanji sucked the last drag off his cigarette, dropping the butt onto the ground and rubbing it out with the sole of an oxford.“So, visualize yourself passing the fuck out of this test.”

 

Then Sanji disappeared inside without waiting for a response, taking his usual seat in the front row, and Zoro sat somewhere near the back.Every time he struggled with a question, he'd look at Sanji's back, remembering bits and pieces of what they'd just gone over.When time ran out, Zoro was at least _done_ with his test—whether or not the answers were right, he didn't know.

 

As they walked back to the Sunny, Zoro expected Sanji to ask him questions—the usual shit, like how he felt, how he thought he did, something like that.Questions Zoro hated, but he braced himself.

 

But as they strolled home, Sanji didn't say a single word.He just puffed on yet another cigarette, hands shoved deep in his jacket pockets, matching Zoro's pace stride for stride.

 

As soon as they got home, Sanji stubbed out his cigarette in the nearest ashtray—which happened to be on the coffee table—and let himself sink onto the couch, propping his feet up on the arm.“Give me two hours and then we'll do your Econ Stat bullshit.”

 

“Uh, sure.”  

 

Damn, was he really about to keep going? Really?He'd remembered Zoro's exam schedule too, which was even stranger—but as Zoro fell down on his bed after setting a few alarms on his phone, he fell asleep almost immediately, so he didn't think about it too hard.

 

One by one, he got through his exams, and after he got done with a big goddamn nap after his Tuesday overnight shift and Wednesday morning exam, he wandered into Sanji's room.Only one more test to go.

 

“Get your beauty sleep?”Sanji asked, giving him that slightly crooked sarcastic-asshole grin that made Zoro roll his eyes.

 

“Fuck off.”

 

“Did you get your grade yet?”

 

Zoro blinked a couple of times.He was still a little groggy.“... Grade?” he asked finally, when he really couldn't piece together what Sanji meant.

 

“Yeah, our exam grades are online.”

 

“Oh.”Business Ethics.Right.

 

“You gonna check how you did?”

 

Zoro shook his head. “Nah.”

 

“What.”

 

“I don't do that.”

 

“Are you fucking serious?” Sanji stared at him.“You don't want to find out if you passed after all that shit we did?”

 

He shook his head a second time.“I'll wait to get all my grades at once.It's less painful that way.Like ripping off a bandaid.”

 

“You dumb fuck.”Sanji shook his head in disapproval.But he didn't bring it up again.

 

It was Friday night when Zoro decided it was time to rip off that bandaid.All of his exam grades should've been posted, since final grades would be out the following week.Even though he'd slept all afternoon after working his Thursday night/Friday morning double shift, he still felt like he'd been thrown off a cliff.The kind of exhaustion that actually made his body physically hurt.  

 

So, maybe getting his results wouldn't hurt that much worse.He grabbed a beer in anticipation.

 

He logged into the student portal, taking a long swig from his can—and holy fucking _shit,_ he'd actually passed that fucking test for Economical Statistics II.Econ Stat.Whatever. Although it was just a D, goddamn, that meant he'd probably pass the course.He'd been one hundred percent sure he'd be retaking that class.So if he didn't fail _that_ class, maybe—

 

Holy _fuck._ The next two—Managerial Accounting and Corporate Information Technology—were even better.He'd gotten _C's._  

 

And as he checked the last class, a grin spread across his face, and he brought his beer to his lips and chugged the whole thing, slamming it down on the table in victory.

 

Business Ethics:B+.

 

He headed into the kitchen to grab another victory beer—it was still a couple hours until work—and took a seat on the couch.Sanji would be off work before he needed to leave, and he definitely wanted to tell him. After all, without him, Zoro definitely wouldn't have passed some of those tests, and may have never gotten a B on an exam in his life.Nah, not just a B—a _B+._

 

It'd been a weird couple of weeks, spending all that time with Sanji, and although they clashed a lot, Zoro had to admit, they got along pretty well together. Kind of. In their own weird way. He hadn't really minded it, the way he probably should have.And okay, he'd felt a bizarre sort of closeness to all of the people in that house—it was strange, they gave off this comfortable homey vibe that he didn't really dislike—but Zoro'd always felt the most distant from Sanji.Now, though, he'd admit it—he probably couldn't say they were anything but friends.

 

“Friend” wasn't a term Zoro threw around too much, either.Most of his friends were people who stuck to him and he just got used to—and, well, that was really the case with Sanji, too, but he probably owed Sanji.Maybe he'd do something for him.Like admit his food was good for a change.That'd probably work.

 

Sanji never came home before Zoro had to go to work, though, so he didn't get the chance to tell him the good news.And even though Zoro tried to anticipate his work schedule, he didn't see Sanji for the rest of the weekend.By the time Zoro got home from work, Sanji'd be asleep, and when Zoro woke up, he would be gone.Well, it was normal to do some fun shit after exams were over.

 

When Zoro finally saw Sanji, he was actually rushing out the door.

 

“Hey, wait up a sec,” Zoro said, pulling himself up off the couch.

 

“I'm in a hurry,” Sanji said, taking long strides to the front door, not turning to look at Zoro.

 

“I just wanted to tell you—”

 

“Later, okay?”

 

The hell? “It'll take ten goddamn seconds.”

 

“Then take ten seconds later—” Sanji started.

 

Zoro had caught up to him as he swung the door open, grabbing him roughly by his forearm.

 

“My grades.I finally checked them a couple nights ago, but I haven't seen you.”

 

“Yeah? So?” Sanji asked, yanking his arm away, not quite meeting Zoro's eyes.

 

“I fucking did it, man.”Zoro could feel the smile playing at the corner of his lips, even as he tried to hold it back.

 

“You passed?”Sanji looked up at him.

 

“Yeah.”

 

“What'd you get?”

 

“One D, two C's, and in Business Ethics—I got a fucking B+.”

 

“Wow, that's still kind of shitty.”

 

“God, you're an asshole.I mean, you're a fucking jerk—but, thanks,” he grinned, unable to hold it back anymore. 

 

Sanji almost looked like he froze for a second, like not even breathing, but that was probably just because Zoro was used to seeing him in a motion a lot.And then he smiled, of all things.Not that stupid, sarcastic smile—but like, an actual smile.Zoro didn't know if he'd ever seen something like that on his face before. Not directed straight at him. 

 

"Good job, idiot,” Sanji said quietly. 

 

But he was in a hurry, so he popped an unlit cigarette in his mouth and spun around, leaving without another word.

 

The exchange felt a little bit weird, but Zoro wasn't really used to letting himself get indebted to people, so he seldom got into these types of situations.

 

But man, Sanji had really gone out of his way for him.The obvious glaring question about the whole thing was _why_ Sanji had been breaking his back over making sure Zoro didn't flunk out of college.And the more Zoro thought about it, the more he decided not to ask.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Robin hadn't intended on stopping, but as the word _poneglyph_ flashed in her periphery, she unconsciously paused to read the oversized poster advertising the next exhibition. 

 

“You know,” Franky said in a hushed voice, leaning over toward her, like he was about to tell her a secret.“I know all about you being a super star archaeologist.”

 

“I don't think I've ever heard it phrased quite like that before,” Robin replied carefully, already regretting that she'd paid any attention to the poster.

 

It wasn't a surprise that Franky was aware of what she used to do, though; the university used her as a selling point, even though teaching undergraduate history classes had nothing to do with her past career.Past life, almost. 

 

“You have things in that exhibit, don't you?”

 

“Guilty,” she smiled thinly.

 

“See—super famous and accomplished.In fact, I'm sure you still are!Not a lot of people in our lifetime have made breakthroughs about human history like you have.”

 

“Ah, it's been a few years now, though.”Robin was intentionally dismissive as she spoke, and she was relieved when Franky shifted the conversation back to one of the exhibits they'd just seen.

 

They'd spent all afternoon at the museum.Franky was somewhat unpredictable, but when it came to weekend outings, the places he picked were charmingly normal.  

 

Hmm, she should probably think of it more as a date, though.They'd been getting together at least once or twice a week—and although it hadn't been more than spending time together, there was no doubt about the intention of it.

 

Franky was a funny and energetic man—but she had drawn a very clear line in her head, and she didn't intend on stepping over it.And it appeared that he was, hopefully, sitting on that line as well.Every once in awhile he gave her this look that made her feel apprehensive.But then he'd switch on that goofy, infectious grin and she'd remember Franky was just that kind of a person.No matter who Franky spoke to—student, colleague or random person on the street—he had an enthusiasm that made the person he was speaking to feel like they were the axis his world was spinning on.  

 

So that was safe. It was alright, for him to look at her like that.

 

In the past, when Robin had gone on dates to museums, it'd been painfully dull.But Franky approached every exhibit with a contagious vigor, and she found herself smiling as he eagerly read the descriptive placards and told her about what he knew; and likewise, when she had a few points to add, his attention was on her like it was the best story he'd ever heard.She was having a lot of fun. Which she hadn't expected.

 

By the time they'd seen the entire scope of the museum—including a back room that was supposed to be for employees only that Franky had pulled her into, a mischievous smile on his face as he yell-whispered, “come on, there's no one around!”—Robin's cheeks ached, just a little.This typically happened when she was around Franky too long; she wasn't used to smiling so much.

 

The places Franky chose to eat were often unpredictable as well.They stopped for dinner at this little hole-in-the-wall Thai place that looked like it hadn't been renovated since the mid-70's, but Franky insisted they had some of the best chicken satay he'd ever had.Earlier that week, it'd been a fancy upscale place called Mariejois.Last weekend, a food truck.  

 

“You're published in just as many journals as I am,” Franky said out of nowhere, shortly after they'd ordered their food.“Maybe more, come to think of it.”

 

It seemed random, but Robin quickly understood that this was a continuation of their earlier conversation.A conversation she didn't particularly _want_ to continue. 

 

“You don't know that,” she said politely, folding her hands across her lap.

 

“I do know, though,” Franky said boldly, taking a lengthy sip of Coke from his straw.“I've read a bunch of your stuff, actually.I mean, I did, even before we started—uh, talking.Like that article in the Archaeological Journal earlier this year.”

 

“Is that so.”

 

“Yeah! Your findings are pretty, well—huge. Totally incredible—no, momentous.”He sat up straighter, leaning forward a little bit as he went on.“Think about it.Most of the discoveries in the last couple of decades have been pretty minor.But you not only discovered something incredible, you also deciphered it—cracked some weird thousands-of-year-old code well enough to find more.”

 

“I only had a small role.There are others who did far more than me.Others who are _still_ doing more.”

 

“It all began with you, though,” Franky insisted, not willing to let the topic drop.And to her surprise, Franky started talking about her most recent article in detail.He'd not only read it, he'd clearly marinated on it and reread it, too.There were a few sections he quoted nearly verbatim.  

 

Although she didn't really want to talk about this, she couldn't help but be flattered.And she was even more impressed when he named five or six other journals she had been published in.Impressed, and maybe a little embarrassed.  

 

“I'm surprised you read all that,” she told him honestly.“It's not really part of your bailiwick.”

 

“Well, you know, I wanted to—” Franky started, but then he cut himself off, scratching his head and laughing.“I started and couldn't stop.” 

 

The corner of her lip upturned slightly.“It seems I hooked you in.”

 

Franky's laughter faded, and he took a long breath as he looked at her—still smiling that same, silly grin he nearly always had on his face, like he was really having a good time in life—but the look in his eyes was something different—

 

Robin shifted in her chair slightly, straightening her back.She remembered the line she'd been thinking about earlier, the line she wasn't going to cross, and suddenly she realized she needed to proceed with care.Because that expression was dangerous.

 

“You did—it's not usually my cup of tea to read about history and stuff, but everything you did was super interesting.”

 

“Thank you, that's a tremendous compliment,” she said sincerely.

 

“Can I ask you a question?”

 

Robin would have preferred that he didn't.Still, she nodded faintly.There was no way to respond to that question any other way.

 

“It sounded like you had it made back in those days.Why in the world did you leave all that incredible shit you were doing to come teach at this college?”

 

Robin held back a sigh. It was just the question she suspected—a question she had grown quite skillful at evading over the last few years.Everyone always wondered the very same thing Franky had just asked her—although they usually didn't phrase it in such a colorful way.

 

Glancing up, she saw his intelligent eyes were fixed on her, and he folded his arms in front of him as he patiently awaited her reply.Robin knew with certainty that no one had ever wanted to hear her reply so earnestly before.Besides, there was probably no harm in answering the question truthfully for a change—after all, they did speak to each other fairly candidly, and this would have nothing to do with crossing that line she was so leery of. 

 

“I loved the job I was doing,” she started, carefully selecting the words, her gaze falling to the tabletop.“But all of the attention, the interviews, the public appearances...I couldn't stand it.I wanted to discover pieces of history, and the fame took me away from all of it.”

 

Franky listened to her intently, leaning in to hear her better, his gaze never once turning away, as she told him some of the stories—of the people and experiences that made the thing she was supposed to love doing turn awful and cheap.

 

“Wow, I see what you mean,” Franky finally said, nodding heavily. “That sounds pretty rough.I can't even imagine what that'd be like.”

 

“I assumed you going by ‘Franky’ rather than your actual name was you employing the use of an alias. Your work is impressive in its own right—I assume you’ve received a fair amount of attention,” Robin replied. 

 

“Well—er, I guess that’s part of it. But, uh, mostly I just really hate that name.” 

 

“Why? It’s a fine name.”

 

Franky laughed, and Robin smiled along with him. She _was_ being honest, though. She continued their conversation. 

 

“Even with all of the bad things, though, it still served an important purpose.It probably wasn't right of me to abandon my work.”And Robin had been terribly _good_ at her work, too.If she'd stayed on the scene, so much more would've been accomplished by now—more of the poneglyphs would've surely been found, because the current researchers weren't deciphering the clues properly, weren't paying attention to the hints and signs.  

 

“'Abandon' is a pretty strong word to use.Most people change careers several times during their lives.”

 

“Maybe.But it was more like I was running away.You could say I've been running away all this time.”She shrugged, and leaned back in her seat, her gaze falling to her glass.

 

She continued staring downward, and Franky stayed surprisingly silent, like he knew she had more to say.

 

“When I got out, all I wanted to teach was history—real history, not the glazed-over, convenient history that it seems like most people are teaching these days.I could've probably made a bigger impact if I had continued doing what I had been, though—making discoveries about our past as humans.But any way we learn about the past is important, so I felt like at least if I was passing on some of what I knew, it'd still be worthwhile, despite the big thing I'd left behind.”  

 

Robin realized he tone was becoming unintentionally apologetic, and she stopped for a moment to collect herself. 

 

“Why do you say it like it's a bad thing?” Franky broke in.“Teaching _is_ a super important and worthwhile job.Sure, maybe you only have a couple classes full of students each semester, but that doesn't make it less important than what you used to do.”

 

Her gaze snapped upward, meeting his eyes.He'd caught her by surprise and she was honestly at a loss for words.

 

“You like to teach, right?And it's what you want to do right now?More than anything else?”

 

So bluntly put.Robin considered all the things that weighed down on her conscience—the expectations everyone had for her, the responsibilities she'd left behind, the discoveries she'd abandoned.It was true that she harbored some guilt—

 

But in the end, the answer to Franky's question was easy. “Yes, it is.”

 

Teaching _was_ what she wanted to do right now.And she enjoyed it.

 

“Then that's _super!_ ” Franky exclaimed, slapping a hand on the tabletop and grinning so hard, Robin wondered if maybe she'd never seen him _really_ smile before.“You don't owe anybody anything for choosing what you want to do with your life.You don't have to live your life for anyone other than yourself.So you shouldn't feel guilty about doing what makes you happy.”

 

Robin stared at him, and for maybe the first time in her life, she knew what it felt like to be stunned speechless.

 

No one had ever supported her decision before—but Franky did. 

 

The rest of the evening, the conversation never hit such a serious point again.They talked about school and students and history and technology, and even though Franky seemed like a goofball of a man, he was really sharp, and she enjoyed every second of the conversation.  

 

There was a line Robin didn't really want to cross right now. And she was forgetting exactly where she'd meant to place it.

 

 

* * *

 

 

“But you’ll be back for New Years Eve, right?” Luffy asked Chopper, looking as concerned as Luffy could ever look. 

 

Chopper nodded, even patting Luffy on the shoulder. “I’m only gone for a few days. My grandma would probably really kill me if I didn’t come home for Christmas and my birthday.” 

 

Oh yeah. Chopper’s big 18th birthday was right around the corner. Zoro was amused by the whole exchange as he watched from his usual spot at the end of the couch. Luffy had given Nami similar treatment when she’d left to visit her sister last month. 

 

Speaking of Nami, Zoro hadn’t seen her much lately. She was as scarce as Sanji was in that house anymore. Also weird, because Zoro wouldn’t have even noticed that sort of shit before—his roommates being gone. But the tenants of the Thousand Sunny had a tendency to work their way into his thoughts more often than people typically did. 

 

“Well, tell your grandma we all say hello, and take these, and try not to eat them all on the way there,” Sanji said from the kitchen, walking over and loading Chopper up with some tupperware full of these chocolate things he’d been making for a good part of the morning. 

 

Sanji was spending his day off at home for a change. Zoro had hardly seen him at all since he’d found out about his exam grades. 

 

“Thanks,” Chopper grinned, and Zoro could smell those damn chocolate things and his mouth was getting all watery. He’d never make a big fuss out of Sanji’s cooking like everyone else did, because whatever, it was just _food_ in the end, it wasn’t like he was performing _miracles_ , but Zoro’s mouth had developed this stupid habit of watering whenever he smelled Sanji’s desserts either way. 

 

Sanji glanced at Zoro, and Zoro caught him. 

 

“You gonna share any of those with the rest of us, asshole?” Zoro asked.

 

Sanji almost looked like he was bristling up, and he gave Zoro this half-hearted sneer as he said, “When have I ever not made enough food to stuff all of you ungrateful shitheads?” 

 

Zoro snorted. Good point, though. He looked over the back of the couch towards the kitchen. “If you planned on there being enough for everyone, you might want to hurry.” 

 

“Hurry?” Sanji followed Zoro’s eyes to the kitchen, and he immediately barked a few curses so loud that Chopper jumped a little, and Sanji was immediately chasing Luffy away from his main batch of chocolate dessert things.Zoro didn’t actually know what they were called.

 

To his right, Zoro noticed Chopper smiling, and he realized he was smiling along with him as they both watched Luffy’s mad dash over the couch and around the coffee table, trying to stuff his mouth full with desserts as he ran from Sanji.

 

Nami walked in the door just as Sanji was throwing a spatula across the room at Luffy. 

 

Chopper was outright laughing, and while he might have scolded two grown-ass adults for running around the house and throwing kitchen utensils at full force a few months ago, now he was just giggling so hard that he was growing red in the face over Luffy getting smacked in the forehead with a spatula. 

 

“Chopper!” Nami said, grinning at him, and she threw her huge bag on the couch next to Zoro and gathered Chopper into a tight hug, totally ignoring or maybe not even noticing Luffy and Sanji at this point. “I’m so glad I caught you before you left!” 

 

“Nami!” Sanji shouted, out of breath, “I made chocolate Christmas dessert things!”

 

Pff. Even that idiot didn’t have a name for them. Figured. 

 

“They smell _really good_ ,” Nami smiled at Sanji, and Zoro watched him forget about Luffy entirely and look like he was about to hug himself in congratulations. 

 

Fucking dumbshit. 

 

Nami made sure Chopper remembered everything he needed for a short trip home like she was his older sister or something, and maybe that was kind of fitting, in a way. And out of all of them, as far as Zoro knew, Nami was the only one who had a sister. Who had any siblings at all. 

 

Usopp came down the stairs, his hair still wet from a shower, and he was shivering because it was always cold on the downstairs level of that house—shitty insulation—and he immediately started drifting towards Sanji’s desserts. 

 

“These are done?” Usopp asked, leaning over the counter/bar. 

 

“Yeah—take some before Luffy steals all of them,” Sanji said, shooting Luffy a menacing sort of glare. Luffy wrinkled his nose at Sanji. 

 

“Usopp, we should probably leave soon—I don’t want to miss the train, you know?” Chopper said, checking his pockets. Probably taking inventory. 

 

“Ready when you are,” Usopp replied with his mouth full. 

 

Usopp and Chopper found their coats, and Usopp grabbed one of the two overstuffed bags that Chopper was trying to shoulder and pulled him out the door. 

 

After that, Nami and Zoro and Luffy all gathered around the counter/bar and set to work on demolishing Sanji’s desserts, because fine, they were goddamn good as hell. And Sanji had made way too many of them. He had anticipated this. Asshole. 

 

“I have things to do today,” Luffy said, four of the little pastry things in both hands, trying to eat as fast as he could while maintaining the ability to talk, “but later tonight—you guys wanna go to a party?” 

 

“I was going to go somewhere—“ Sanji started to say from where he was perched on the back of the couch with an ash tray in his lap. 

 

“Is this an actual big party, or is it going to be, like, Law and his friends?” Nami asked, peeling apart Sanji’s desserts and eating them in pieces. 

 

“I think a lot of people are going. It isn’t at his frat, it’s, uh, somewhere… somewhere pretty close. Maybe we’ve been there before,” Luffy said absently, paying more attention to his food than Nami. “And hey, I _like_ Trafountain—“

 

“We know you do. I’ll go, sounds fun,” Nami replied, cutting him off, and she reached for another pastry thing. 

 

“I’ll go if you’re going,” Sanji grinned at Nami. 

 

“Oh, weren’t you going _somewhere_ tonight?” Nami called him out, raising her eyebrows at him. Zoro shoved two pastries in his mouth at once and watched Sanji from the corner of his eye. 

 

“Ahh, they just cancelled on me,” Sanji returned, taking a long drag from his cigarette. 

 

“Can’t imagine why,” Zoro said, reaching for one of the glasses of milk Sanji had poured for all of them. 

 

“Hey, fuck you,” Sanji replied, but it was all casual, him at his baseline. 

 

Shit hadn’t really escalated between them for a _while._ Which, it went without saying that it was weird—they had sort of decomposed into this comfortable level of co-existence where they still called each other names and said shitty, insulting things back and forth, but it didn’t have the same… Well. Zoro wasn’t about to just start calling Sanji by his actual name to his face. 

 

Zoro turned his attention to Luffy. “I’ll go to the party.” 

 

“Ugh, you will?” Sanji asked from the couch, and Zoro twisted in his seat to glare at Sanji. 

 

That stupid jerk looked like he was genuinely a little dismayed that Zoro had decided to go to the dumb party. Whatever, fine. 

 

“If you have a problem with it, I’m definitely going,” Zoro said, grabbing for one of the last pastries. 

 

Sanji stubbed his cigarette out in his ash tray and sniffed, “It’s just that seeing your face ruins things for me.” 

 

“Good,” Zoro said, and he turned back around. 

 

“So you’re all going! Perfect. Awesome. We’ll make Usopp go, too,” Luffy grinned, and he started taking long gulps of his milk, being that the desserts were all gone and he could afford time to actually stop and take a drink. 

 

“That won’t be hard,” Nami said, and Luffy gave her a thumbs-up while he chugged his glass. 

 

When he was finished, he wiped the mustache from his mouth, and he turned to Nami and put both his hands on her shoulders. “Then I leave you with the job of making Usopp come with us tonight when he gets back from the train station.”

 

She returned his serious expression and nodded once. “Got it.” 

 

He smiled at her and disappeared into the basement where he slept, where none of them had ever ventured because they’d never actually had a reason to. After that, without missing much of a beat, Sanji wandered upstairs, and Zoro could hear the squeaking hinges on Sanji’s bedroom door as he shut it. 

 

“So!” Nami said, grabbing one of _his_ beers out of the fridge and walking over to the couch. “I heard you did pretty good on your exams.” 

 

Zoro frowned. And then he went to grab himself a fresh can, and he joined her on the long couch. “I did.” 

 

“Sanji told me. Proud of you!” Nami clinked her can of beer against his and looked back at the television. The documentary was about some nerd named Bob Lazar. The volume was turned down really low, but Zoro kept hearing the name pop up from the background noise. 

 

Zoro cracked open his beer. “Why’d he say that?” 

 

“Oh, he and I were talking about how our exams went, and he said he did pretty well, and I was telling him about the robot that Usopp made—he showed it to me before he turned it in. It was nuts, Zoro, that kid is so _smart._ Anyway, Sanji and I were both just discussing how brilliant we all are, and he said that even you did well.” 

 

Zoro snorted. “I did decently. It was mostly his doing, anyway.” 

 

“Was it?” Nami looked back over at him.

 

Zoro hadn’t really thought about his comment before making it. “I mean—you saw him helping me.” 

 

“Yeah, here and there, but I was busy studying for my own tests. Plus, I’ve been working a lot.” 

 

So that’s why Nami was gone all the time. She and Sanji both seemed like they worked more than normal people should. 

 

“Well,” Zoro replied slowly, and he was watching the goofy looking guy on the documentary as he said to Nami, “he helped me study a lot.” 

 

“Did he.” 

 

Zoro took another drink of his beer. “Yeah.” 

 

Nami didn’t say anything after that. 

 

“I don’t really know why the hell he did it either,” Zoro said after a few seconds. “I wasn’t planning on asking.” 

 

Nami tapped her fingertips against her sweaty can, looking down at her lap. “Sanji is…” 

 

Zoro didn’t speak, waiting for her to finish out her thought. 

 

Nami looked over the back of the couch, towards the stairs, like Sanji was going to be sitting at the top of them, eavesdropping in on their conversation like some kid listening in on his parents. 

 

Nami sighed. “I don’t know. I think Sanji’s just as lost as the rest of us.” 

 

Zoro wasn’t sure what she meant by that. Not entirely, anyway. But feeling lost—that was something he was familiar with, in all senses of the word. 

 

And Sanji… he—he made everything he did look fucking _easy_ , like his grades and his cooking and all that shit he was good at. To Zoro, Sanji wasn’t someone who was _lost._

 

Zoro didn’t say much to Nami after that. And that was normal. He’d sat and drank with and not talked to her plenty of times before. 

 

Time passed, and Luffy came upstairs just as Usopp walked in the door. 

 

“Oh, Usopp! Hey! I mean, Nami!” Luffy pointed from Usopp to Nami as he pulled on a big dark green hoodie. “Remember your job!” 

 

“I remember,” Nami said, and she ignored the look Usopp was giving her.

 

“Okay! I’m off! I’ll see you all tonight!” Luffy announced as he pushed his other arm through the remaining sleeve. 

 

Usopp moved out of the way as Luffy slipped through the front door, saying, “Bye?” as Luffy gave him a quick pat on the chest on his way out. 

 

After a couple beats and the fading sound of a scooter engine, Usopp turned to Nami. “Your job?” 

 

“Oh,” Nami smiled, “Luffy wants you to come with us to some party tonight. Early Christmas party, maybe. Close to here, I think.” 

 

“Oh.” Usopp paused. “You’re both going?” 

 

“Yep,” Zoro said, raising his beer a little in some kind of hand-gesture confirmation. He didn’t know why he just did that.

 

“So… yeah, I’ll go? Why did you need to be assigned to that?” 

 

Nami shrugged. “I’unno, I told him it wouldn’t be hard.” 

 

So Usopp joined them in wasting the afternoon away with beer and alien documentaries—and this wasn’t the first time Zoro had sat and drank with those two, and the way they bounced off each other and made up dumb commentary and talked over the narrator on the television was like a current he’d get caught up in, and he always found himself smiling around Usopp and Nami when they got this way, even though most of the shit they said was so _stupid_.  

 

Sanji trudged down the stairs after an hour or two with his phone in his hand. 

 

“I’m making breakfast for dinner,” he announced, rolling up his sleeves. 

 

“Why?” Usopp asked, turning around to look back at Sanji. “Not that… not that I _mind_ you cooking breakfast right now.” 

 

“Hangovers!” Sanji replied, tapping his temple. “A bunch of different breakfast foods help stop hangovers—it’s a shame asparagus is out of season. I used to always make myself asparagus things before I went out. That shit is a life-saver.” 

 

“Asparagus?” Nami asked, making a face. 

 

“Yes! Asparagus helps prevent hangovers.” 

 

He looked so dumb when he got all enthusiastic over food like that. 

 

“Can you make those one kinds of eggs where you can dip the things in them? Where the outside is hard and the inside isn’t?” Usopp asked, looking all hopeful. 

 

“You want them soft boiled.” 

 

“I think so? You served them to us in shot glasses that one time because we didn’t have any of the fancy egg holder… cup things.” 

 

Sanji snorted. “You got it.” 

 

Zoro cleared his throat. “Can we have hash browns, too?” 

 

Sanji looked over at Zoro, making some face like he was annoyed over the request, even though hash browns were probably really simple for an asshole like him. But in the end, Sanji nodded and said, “Sure thing,” and set to work. 

 

“Thanks, Dad,” Zoro replied, and he smiled just a little bit when he saw Sanji roll his eyes. 

 

Luffy came back home at about the same time Sanji was finishing up and plating everything to be served. With a gasp, Luffy threw his hood back and power-walked to the kitchen counter/bar. 

 

“Oh shit, are we having _breakfast for dinner?_ ” Luffy breathed, that nutso grin spreading across his entire face. 

 

“We are,” Sanji replied, watching Luffy with his spatula in hand, like he was ready to defend any sudden attacks made on the buffet. 

 

“Oh _cool,_ that is _awesome!”_

 

Sanji was staring Luffy down like a damn hawk as he asked, slipping his left hand into his pocket, “Do you like breakfast foods the most?” 

 

“Not particularly,” Luffy said, climbing up onto one of the metal stools. “I mean, I love them, who doesn’t—but I mostly like all food equally. Except meat, I like that the most.” 

 

Zoro stood and walked over, and he looked where Sanji’s eyes kept drifting—his gaze went from Luffy’s nose to his eyes and back again. And the spot under Luffy’s nose was extra red. Like, his nostrils were all… dark and raw-looking. It hadn’t looked like that before he left. Luffy’d had a nosebleed sometime recently. Made sense that Sanji would pick up on that. Judging by the crook in Sanji’s nose, he’d most likely had enough broken and bloody noses to recognize through experience. 

 

Sanji looked from Luffy to Zoro, and once their eyes met, Zoro saw the slight shake of Sanji’s head back and forth—so subtle that only he could’ve noticed—and Zoro nodded just slightly, just once. They both silently agreed to say nothing about it. 

 

It wasn’t for them to announce or talk about. 

 

“Well, eat as much as you want—this is an anti-hangover breakfast dinner,” Sanji said, his eyes right back on Luffy like they’d never left. Luffy didn’t need to be told that he should eat as much as he wanted. He was already inhaling his first serving. 

 

Nami and Usopp worked their way over, and the whole house feasted with the intent of getting very drunk later that night. Well, except for Chopper. It was weird, how things didn’t feel… _complete_ without him there. Well, whatever. Like he said, he’d be back in a few days. 

 

“Oh! So—“ Luffy spun in his stool and faced Usopp. “You’re going, right? To the party?” 

 

“Of course I’m going,” Usopp said, dipping some toast in his fancy soft boiled egg. “What else am I going to do tonight? Stay at the Sunny and read a book? It’s Christmas break.” Usopp grinned at Luffy. “Obviously I’m gonna get wrecked with all of you.” 

 

“Good answer,” Luffy matched Usopp’s expression, and they toasted their shot glass eggs together. 

 

Maybe it was the fact that school was out for a little while, and that none of them had to work the next day, as far as Zoro knew—either way, after their anti-hangover prep meal, everyone spent time primping their shit and trying to look nice. Getting ready for the night. Zoro didn’t bother with all that, but he did end up digging this sort of muted, earthy-colored shirt that fit him pretty good out of his closet. An old friend of his had given it to him, insisting he owned at least one article of clothing that looked decent on him. He hadn’t worn it since he moved into the Sunny. But, well, whatever, everyone else was dressing up, so fuck it. 

 

Everyone took way longer than Zoro. But this was normal. 

 

He sat on the couch, trying to wake himself up. He’d had a lot to eat at dinner. Passing on the party and passing out on his bed was starting to sound pretty damn appealing. 

 

But he rubbed his eyes and sat up as Sanji and Nami came down the stairs at the same time, and Zoro could hear him telling her how good she looked, and Zoro really didn’t want to hear him yammering on and on about her—it was obnoxious—until he stopped suddenly. 

 

“Oh hey, fuckwit, you look a little less homely than normal,” Sanji said to him as he strolled around the couch, grinning at him with his fists shoved into his pants pockets. Zoro was already grinding his teeth together, clenching and unclenching his jaw. 

 

“Well—” Zoro began, ready to tell Sanji how fucking stupid he looked, but Nami cut him off. 

 

“Yeah, Zoro, you look so _dashing_ , look at you!”

 

Zoro frowned at her. 

 

It was just a fucking shirt. 

 

Nami and Sanji and Zoro sat and drank some shitty beers they’d found orphaned in the fridge and argued and passed the time together. 

 

When Luffy and Usopp finally joined them, they chugged what remained of their crappy IPAs and left the empty bottles sitting on the counter/bar. 

 

Zoro followed the group out the door, flipping off the lights as he went, and Luffy hadn’t lied—the place where the party was happening really was close by.Aside from driving down the wrong street a couple times, it only took them a few minutes to get there.

 

They probably could've just walked—but then, it was kind of snowy outside. Like, the streets were pretty clear, but the sidewalks were still all white.Plus, it was cold as shit.

 

“Isn’t this place huge!” Luffy said as they all climbed out of Usopp’s car, shivering and shaking. There hadn’t even been enough time for Usopp’s car to warm up on the drive over. They were all freezing. 

 

Luffy was right, though. The place was _huge._  

 

It was this big-ass frat house on top of a small hill, with a giant manicured front yard, lots of plants, and a walkway leading to the door. The house looked three stories tall. Zoro could already hear the music pumping out of it from down the street. He could see there were _so_ many damn people going in and out and swarming all around the house. Like ants on an anthill. 

 

Zoro had seen this frat house before. They all had—it was hard to miss a mansion that big. They’d driven by it lots of times before. Kind of weird that he was actually going inside the place now, after having stared at the outside of it so many times. The place was a castle, basically. 

 

A castle stuffed to the brim with drunk people on break from school. Christ. 

 

“So,” Luffy said as they all hurried down the sidewalk towards the party, hands plunged in their pockets, doing that super fast, brisk walk that people do in the winter, “there are a lot of people here.” 

 

“Duh,” Nami said, her teeth all chattery.

 

“So if you guys are doing that thing later where you want to leave and you can’t find me, and I lose my phone, just go without me. I can walk home.” Luffy looked at the rest of them. 

 

“That is _surprisingly_ thoughtful of you,” Nami commented, huddling in on herself. Her outfit choice, out of all of the Thousand Sunny tenants that night, was the most brutal for the weather. Heels were a bad decision. Well, in Zoro’s opinion, they were bad. Sanji was a big fan, though. Of course he was. She was almost taller than him in those things. And she was doing a really good job of not falling and busting her ass in the snow.

 

Sanji shouldn’t have even bothered with a jacket, judging by the thing hanging from his shoulders. It didn’t even have a fucking zipper.

 

Zoro understood why they dressed so terribly, though, once they got inside the house. With the sheer number of people in there, the body heat level made the whole place goddamn stifling. Like, there was an extreme temperature change almost as soon as Zoro walked through the threshold. 

 

There were so, so many people crammed in there, jeez. Definitely way more than there’d been at the Sunny on Halloween. 

 

“Zoro, look!” Luffy shouted at him once they were inside, curling a fist around the front of Zoro’s shirt and directing his attention to a group of people doing a keg stand in the next room over. Luffy was looking at a girl chugging beer while doing a handstand on the keg like he was extremely impressed with her skill. Her skill of drinking a lot of beer upside-down.  

 

“No,” Zoro said, looking back down at Luffy. 

 

“ _Aw!_ Zoro, we should! You could do it longer than anyone, I bet,” Luffy said, nudging him a little. “You would be the best, you would win.” 

 

“It’s not a contest,” Zoro said, and Luffy looked disappointed for all of a second before Sanji pushed his way up to him. 

 

“You want to do a keg stand? Let’s do it, come on,” Sanji said, grabbing Luffy and pulling him along, and Luffy cheered and was practically bouncing in Sanji’s wake. 

 

Zoro looked over at Nami and Usopp, who were watching the whole thing, and Usopp was grinning and it only took him a second to join the other two idiots in their keg debut. 

 

Nami and Zoro gravitated towards each other, folding their arms over their chests and standing to the side, watching as Luffy waited his turn with visible bated impatience. And when it came time, Luffy pushed himself into a handstand on top of the keg without much help, and Usopp held the hose in his mouth while Sanji held his legs, and they both laughed while everyone around them counted, like the whole group of people stuffed in that room, the count growing louder the higher it got. 

 

Luffy made it to twenty-something before he started squirming, and Sanji let him down, and he wobbled a little once he was upright again, his face totally red, and he threw his arms up in the air while everyone cheered. Zoro could hear him yell over all the people and the music, “ _Handstands are so much fun!_ ” 

 

Zoro laughed and shook his head and Nami spent _maybe_ twenty seconds talking to some guy before she came right back to Zoro with two drinks in hand. She gave one to him and they took deep breaths and looked over at Luffy and Usopp and Sanji, all giddy and stupid already. Sanji was talking to some pretty girl standing next to the keg, and he was tapping it for her and filling her plastic cup, and Zoro rolled his eyes because it fucking figured. 

 

Luffy stumbled back to Zoro and Nami, his cheeks still red, and he grinned at them. “I did _really_ good, you guys.” 

 

“We saw!” Nami said, trying to be loud enough to be heard over the loud techno beat. 

 

“Good! I _may_ barf, but I don’t think I will. Anyway! Trafurniture’s here somewhere. I’m going to find him. I wish he saw me do the keg stand! Okay—I’m—I’ll see you guys!” 

 

Luffy disappeared before Usopp could even make his way back to them. 

 

“Did we lose him already?” Usopp asked, keg beer in hand. 

 

“We did,” Nami said, and she nodded her head towards the rest of the house. “Let’s go see how big this party really is.” 

 

They gave themselves a tour of the castle, drinking and stopping at various clusters of people as they went, like they were at a zoo. There were three levels to the house, with big rooms and nice furniture, and Zoro didn’t say much, but he was entertained nonetheless. 

 

There was a DJ. Of course there was. They’d even had one at the Sunny on Halloween, come to think of it. Lots of people were dancing, and they even ran into Vivi in one of the areas where people were spilling drinks and dancing around, and Nami was pretty damn ecstatic over the reunion. 

 

The whole town was at that party, Zoro was pretty sure. Even he recognized a few people here and there. People he’d had classes with. People Luffy had brought home to the Sunny. People who had come and partied at their house and passed out on the floor. 

 

Usopp and Nami were in their element, and with adding the whole excitement over running into Vivi into the mix, they were off, and Zoro couldn’t really keep up.That was fine, though. He didn’t exactly come to the party to dance. He came because… Well, like Usopp had said, what the hell else was he supposed to do? 

 

So he kept his drink topped off—there was more than one keg at that party, and Zoro decided this was probably his favorite frat at Sabaody, and also the only one he really knew of, other than Law’s—and he followed the trio through the masses, observing more than participating. He’d always been that way in big crowds, though. 

 

He didn’t get _uncomfortable_ , per se, but he didn’t really feel like he had much of a voice. He felt like his words just got swallowed into the black pit of dance music and inebriation. This wasn’t a bad thing, but he didn’t get excited the way Usopp and Nami and Vivi were, and they were having so much fun, and it was nice to be around, but he ended up dipping out and going his own way, eventually. 

 

He saw Luffy surrounded by a big group of people in one of the rooms he passed. Law was standing near him, a drink in one hand, the other pinching the bridge of his nose. Zoro snorted and kept walking. 

 

He drifted between kegs and groups of people. A few people talked to him, and that was fine, he engaged a little—but ultimately, he wasn’t interested. He wasn’t interested in meeting new people at all. He didn’t really care about getting fucked up, either, but he was at a party, so he wasn’t going to stand around being goddamn sober the whole night. 

 

As he wandered, he came across a full bottle of unattended Jameson. Totally unopened. It was just sitting there next to the railing of a flight of winding stairs. Forgotten. What a shame, that someone would forget about one of Zoro’s favorite whiskeys. And just leave it there. 

 

Zoro weaved through groups of people, his new bottle of Jameson in hand, and he drank straight from it with little reserve. It would’ve been nice if he could just find somewhere to _chill_ but goddamn if people weren’t wedged into every corner. 

 

He turned down a hallway that was just absolutely full of people, and they were pressing in around him from just about every side, and Zoro held his bottle against his chest as he moved with the flow. And then, in the middle of the hallway, he ran right into Sanji. 

 

“Hey!” Zoro said, feeling a little drunk and just, at that point, relieved to see a familiar face after being lost in the crowd for so long. 

 

“Hi,” Sanji replied, his hands in his pockets, being knocked around just a little as people shoved past the both of them. They faced each other, blocking up traffic a little. 

 

There was a pause between them as they stood there, ignoring the pushing and drunken shouting coming from all angles around them, and Zoro looked down at his bottle of Jameson.

 

“You wanna do a few shots?” 

 

Sanji raised his eyebrows a little, and he reflected on the offer for a second, and Zoro wanted to smack him. 

 

“It’s just fucking whiskey, you goddamn—“ 

 

“Okay,” Sanji said over the loud background noise, leveling his posture. 

 

The background noise. It wasn’t really background. It was loud—people yelling and laughing and music flooding all the space in between—and Zoro was almost straining to stand against it. 

 

People pushed up against Zoro’s back, and they rubbed shoulders with him, and he almost stumbled forward a little, and just as he was about to start pushing people _back_ , he followed Sanji’s eyes to his immediate left. 

 

There was a bathroom right next to them in that hallway. The door was ajar, and the room was empty with the lights off. Oh, holy shit. 

 

Sanji pushed the door open wider, and Zoro immediately slipped in the room with Sanji following close behind. 

 

Zoro flipped on the lights and closed and locked the door behind them, effectively shutting out the rest of the party for the time being. He took a deep breath and sighed out of total relief, and he turned and looked at Sanji. 

 

Sanji pretty much looked as disheveled as Zoro felt, and his shoulders slumped as he sat on the edge of the bathtub and said, “There are a lot of fucking people here.” 

 

Sanji’s shirt was grey, and his jacket was dark in contrast, and he had the sleeves rolled up past his elbows, and it made his eyes look more grey than blue. 

 

His clothes did that, sometimes. Sometimes his eyes looked more green or grey than blue, depending on what he was wearing. 

 

Zoro looked away and nodded. “I didn’t know it was going to be like this,” he said, and he took the first shot between them, and when he was done, he held the bottle out to Sanji.

 

“This may be the biggest party I’ve ever been to,” Sanji said as he took it from Zoro, leaning forward to reach it without having to actually stand up. 

 

“Me too,” Zoro mumbled, his eyes on the floor. 

 

He listened to the sound of Sanji taking a fat gulp of straight liquor. 

 

When Sanji handed it back, Zoro took it without a word and leaned against the sink and looked around the bathroom. It was pretty nice. It wasn’t too fancy, but then again, it was probably, like, one of five bathrooms in that house. The shower curtain was black and white and went with the rest of the little things placed around the room. 

 

It didn’t look much like something a bunch of frat guys would put together. 

 

“Have you seen any of the others lately?” Sanji asked, fingers curled around the edge of the tub. 

 

“Nah,” Zoro replied, taking another long drink. 

 

“So you’ve just been wandering around by yourself?” 

 

“Isn’t that what you were _just_ doing?” 

 

Sanji clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth. “Well. Kind of.” 

 

Zoro didn’t bother asking what he meant by that. He wasn’t interested. 

 

They sat there in that room together, escaping the suffocation of the party and passing Zoro’s bottle of Jameson back and forth, not saying anything. Zoro didn’t know what to say. And then again. He kind of knew what he wanted to say. 

 

“I wasn’t going to ask why you helped me with my finals,” Zoro said, and Sanji’s eyes snapped up to his. 

 

“So don’t ask, then.” 

 

Zoro paused. “I didn’t flunk _any_ of those damn classes—” 

 

“Yeah, that’s what I intended,” Sanji cut him off, his words bordering on exasperation, and he held his hand out for the bottle, and just out of reflex, Zoro gave it to him. 

 

“Would you shut the fuck up. Just for a minute,” Zoro said as the bottle changed hands, and Sanji made a face at him and craned his neck back and took more than one gulp of Irish whiskey as he sat there, balancing on the rim of the porcelain bathtub. “I don’t know if I owe you or—“

 

“You don’t owe me anything.” 

 

“Then why the fuck did you do all that!” Zoro snapped, and after a few seconds, Sanji offered the bottle back to him and didn’t say anything at all. 

 

Nothing. 

 

“You’re such an asshole all the _fucking_ time, you never goddamn let up, and then you do things like…” Zoro trailed off, and Sanji was glaring at the floor. “… I mean, there’s school, and you were the reason I even have a place to live, and, fuck—“ 

 

“I helped you because you piss me off,” Sanji interrupted him, still talking to the floor. “Because it was so fucking annoying, watching you fail.”

 

Zoro chose not to reply. 

 

“I offered to let you move in because I pitied you, obviously.” 

 

Zoro furrowed his eyebrows. 

 

“I cook for you because you’re too stupid to feed yourself.” 

 

“Hey, fuck you—“ 

 

“And I just fucking…” Sanji rubbed his face, and he stood up and held his hand out for the Jameson, and Zoro, scowling right at him, handed him the bottle. With a deep breath, Sanji took another shot—a long one—and he screwed the cap back on the bottle. And then he took a step closer to Zoro, and Zoro’s expression changed entirely. 

 

Sanji was very close to him, and his eyes were searching, bouncing back and forth between either of Zoro’s pupils, and Zoro didn’t know what—

 

He could feel his breath. Sanji leaned forward a little, and Zoro could feel his breath on his lips, and he opened his mouth to say something, to say anything, _anything_ , and all he could say was —

 

“Sanji—“ 

 

Sanji’s lips were incredibly soft, and they were so warm, and Sanji leaned into him with his eyes closed, their chests pressed together, and Zoro wasn’t breathing, he wasn’t, he wasn’t… This was… 

 

Zoro’s heart crashed into his stomach, and something else bloomed in his chest. 

 

Against Sanji’s lips, his voice caught. 

 

Zoro put his palm flat against Sanji’s chest, and he pushed him away. 

 

He pushed him so fucking hard that Sanji stumbled backwards. He dropped the bottle of Jameson, and it shattered all over the floor. The backs of his shins hit the side of the bathtub, and he lost his balance entirely with a loud, _“Fuck!”_ and he grabbed for the shower curtain and ripped it straight off the rings as he tumbled into the tub.

 

Zoro was already yelling before he hit the ground. 

 

“What the fuck is wrong with you!” he shouted, his hands squeezed into fists, and Sanji looked back up at him, his legs hanging over the side of the bathtub, and he was absolutely silent. 

 

Zoro clenched his jaw so damn hard before he yelled, “Is that what all this shit is to you! Is that all people are to you, you fucking bottom-feeder!” 

 

Sanji, probably for the first time in a long fucking time, had no words. 

 

“I thought…” Zoro started to say, and he stopped. And then he thought better of it, thought better of keeping silent, of keeping everything to himself like he always did, and he said, “I thought you and I were maybe even friends.” 

 

Sanji looked away from him, and Zoro wanted to grab his stupid fucking face and scream at him. But he stayed on his side of that ugly goddamn bathroom, and the smell of alcohol was burning his nose and his eyes. 

 

“I thought that, okay, maybe, under all the layers of total fucking asshole, you were capable of being a decent human being. But you’re the most… fuck, you’re the most fake mother fucker I’ve ever—“ and Zoro didn’t know what else to say, because Sanji wasn’t looking at him, and he wasn’t getting angry, he wasn’t blowing up, he was just sitting there in the fucking bathtub, unmoving and not responding. 

 

Sanji didn’t treat the other tenants of the Thousand Sunny this way. He treated strangers this way. He threw himself at people who were meaningless. Even Nami, he kept his distance from. And now, after all that—after all the hours spent together, awake and near delirious and at each others’ throats, it was all a bunch of total fucking bullshit. Of course this was what it was all about.

 

Zoro ran his hands through his hair as he looked down on Sanji. 

 

That asshole never thought more of him than some jackoff he met on the street. He was a pathetic, selfish, insecure piece of shit that filled all the holes in his life with attention from strangers, and he played with peoples’ feelings like they were fucking ingredients in his goddamn desserts, and when everything was consumed, he moved onto the next meal, and just… fuck him. 

 

“You treat people like objects, and you probably hate yourself so much that the real reason you break your back is that you’re trying to get other people to like you, and you just end up using them for your own selfish shit in the end, because you’re so fucking lonely and vindictive, and fuck you, Sanji,” Zoro said, and he turned around and unlocked the bathroom door and slammed it shut behind him. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you SO much for reading and we will see you in a week for the next installment of december bye~*~


	6. Interlude

“Usopp!” 

 

Usopp looked over his shoulder because he swore he heard his name over the loud music, and he spun around to come face to face with Sanji, who was sporting a particularly serious expression. 

 

“Sanji!” 

 

“Hi—I need a favor from you, can I, uh, talk to you?” 

 

Usopp pursed his eyebrows together and looked at Nami, because what the hell, what could Sanji possibly want from him? Usopp was impressed Sanji could even find him. Usopp and Nami were crowded from all sides by sweaty, loud frat people. Like, there was hardly any space to move around, even. 

 

It’d taken Usopp and Nami a good few minutes to wedge their way up against the wooden island bar in the basement of the totally _lavish_ establishment. The basement in the frat castle they were getting drunk in put the entirety of the Thousand Sunny to shame. They'd decided to check it out after parting ways from Vivi, and damn, it was impressive. Didn't have the Sunny's charm, though. 

 

“Are you alright?” Usopp asked, and Sanji, for a moment, kind of blanked out and looked a little lost. Confused, maybe? Usopp went on, “You just look a little intense right now, man.” 

 

“Oh—oh, everything’s great, it’s really great, really, I just—I just need to talk to you very briefly. You, specifically.” 

 

They had to shout at each other over the music to even be heard. 

 

“Right now?” Usopp yelled through the ten thousand conversations and thumpy bass music pressing in around them. 

 

“Right now,” Sanji confirmed, and then he looked extremely apologetic to Nami. “Is that alright?” 

 

Nami grinned, and it was dumb because it wasn’t like Usopp _belonged_ to Nami. Sanji didn’t need to ask her permission to—

 

“Buy us a round of shots and you can keep him.” 

 

Well, that was fine. That was fair. 

 

Sanji bought them all a round from the heavily perspiring “bartender,” who could only be a first year stuck with the job of selling two dollar cherry bombs in the basement of a frat house party. 

 

They toasted their little plastic cups to each other and craned their necks back in unison, and in several hurried gulps, destroyed their cherry bombs and found themselves all making the same face. 

 

“Eugh, cherry bombs.”

 

“I know.” 

 

Nami wiped her mouth and left her empty cup on the dark wooden bar. “Well, have fun, boys. I should go find Luffy, anyway. I haven’t seen him since his kegstand performance, and who knows what the hell he’s gotten into by now. I feel a little bad in retrospect.” She gave them a small wave and turned to navigate the sea of people all crammed together in the huge basement. Sanji, in turn, clapped a hand on Usopp’s shoulder and pushed him towards the stairs. 

 

Once they were outside, they could see their breaths condensing and turning into vapor, and Sanji lit a cigarette as Usopp zipped up his jacket. His jacket choice for the night was like eight layers too thin for this kind of weather, but he hadn’t planned on spending much time outside in the _frigid cold_. 

 

Both of them slipped a bit on the ice that coated the stairs leading down to the walkway, and they gripped each other for balance. Usopp had just assumed Sanji wanted to stand outside and smoke or something, but he kept walking down the yard and out to the sidewalk, and Usopp had to hurry to catch up. His teeth were already chattering, and he’d just gotten snow in his left shoe, which was, ugh, awful, but he resolved not to complain in favor of finding out what exactly he was doing out there power-walking in minus two hundred degree weather. 

 

“Where are we going?” 

 

“Nowhere. Back to the Sunny. For a minute.” 

 

“I have a car. I have the keys to my car, even, right here in my pocket. In fact, it’s like one block in the opposite direction, and if we turn around now, we can probably _drive_ back.” 

 

“Oh, shut up, the house is less than a mile away, it’s not far. Save the planet and shit.” 

 

“Uh-huh,” Usopp muttered, hugging his arms around himself. “Why?” 

 

“Why what? Why save the planet? Usopp, if we don’t take steps now to save the Earth, who will—“

 

“Why are we leaving the warm party to go back to the Sunny?” 

 

Sanji’s hands were shoved deep in his pockets, and his shoes were not suited for this environment, Usopp noticed, and he looked very… resolved. He looked over as Usopp struggled to keep pace, slipping and sliding in the slush. 

 

“Because there’s a bottle of liquor there that I’m going to grab,” he said, talking around his cigarette.

 

“But there’s plenty of alcohol at the party we just left?” 

 

Sanji rolled his eyes. “Mine is better.” 

 

“Why didn’t you grab it when we left initially?”

 

Pulling the hood of his jacket up—Sanji’s jacket was also way too thin for this weather—he exhaled a long plume of smoke thickened by the vapor of his breath. “I didn’t realize I needed it until just a little while ago.” 

 

“What happened?” 

 

“Nothing.” 

 

Usopp frowned. “Didn’t you just need to talk to me?” 

 

“I do.” 

 

"But you need to do it at home? And you need a super special bottle of liquor for it?" 

 

"Eighteen-year Highland Park," Sanji told him. He did not fail to notice the blank expression on Usopp's face. "Scotch." 

 

"Why are you _hedging?_ " 

 

Sanji stopped walking and looked from Usopp to the row of bushes lining the house they were standing in front of. Usopp shook his head and kept walking. “Never mind.” 

 

Usopp remained silent as they walked as briskly as they could manage without falling and cracking their skulls open. He was a little bit confused. And a little bit extremely cold. He was a little bit drunk, too, but the temperature was sobering him up pretty quickly. Ah, but there was some kind of fancy alcohol back at the Sunny, which Usopp would be drinking, because there was no way he was walking this far in this weather just so Sanji could get drunk enough to talk to him about… Um. 

 

Usopp couldn’t actually think of anything that Sanji would want to talk to him about. Well, nothing he’d need to trudge a mile through the frozen arctic over a bottle of liquor for. Not school—Sanji was just as good a student as Usopp was. And it couldn’t be about Nami because Sanji was always ready to talk to Usopp about Nami, he didn’t need to be drunk for that. Maybe he needed to talk about feelings. Did Sanji have normal-people feelings? Were all French people as intimidating as Sanji? Was Sanji actually French at this point, or was he supposed to call him French-American? Was that even a thing? Or was he just regular American? Usopp didn’t know why he’d ever really need to know Sanji’s technical nationality. Did Sanji think in French or in English? 

 

Sanji stopped walking and flicked the butt of his cigarette into the snow and Usopp realized they’d arrived. He followed Sanji into their vacant, creaking house. The whole building shuddered with the cold, and when it was completely empty, which was pretty damn rare, it was all the more noticeable. 

 

They flipped on the lights inside and Usopp sat down at the big dining table in one of the uneven chairs while Sanji went to his kitchen and pulled two glasses from one of the many dark cabinets lining the upper walls, and he walked over and slid them along the table, and they came to a halt right in front of Usopp. 

 

“I’ll be right back. Stay there.” 

 

Usopp watched Sanji disappear up the stairs, taking them two at a time, and it was only a moment before he reappeared with an unopened bottle of scotch. Fancy scotch, apparently. 

 

Sanji stood next to Usopp as he poured it. “I assumed you wanted to share some.” 

 

“You assumed correctly.” 

 

He filled both of their glasses three-fourths of the way full with just straight scotch and what the hell, alright. 

 

Sanji drank scotch the same way he drank wine and ate food—he took his time and appreciated flavors and stuff and seemingly enjoyed it. Usopp did his best to act like a tough guy who drank straight scotch and grew lots of hair on his chest, and he tried so hard to control the expression on his face as he forced a fat mouthful down his throat. He silently wished for something else to drink immediately after. A chaser. Even water. Eugh, damn, that stuff tasted like motor oil. Mixed with expired cough syrup. 

 

“So you’re fine? You’re alright?” Usopp coughed, trying to make his voice sound deep but really just coming off sounding like someone had punched him in the stomach. 

 

Sanji swallowed again and nodded. “Oh, yeah, I’m fine. I’m… eh, yeah, I’m good. Don’t worry about that. Are you good? I haven’t hardly seen much of you all month.” 

 

The conversation was about Usopp now, suddenly. He raised his eyebrows a little at the shift. But he went with it. 

 

“Finals were a bitch.” 

 

Sanji nodded heavily, turning his glass in a slow rotation on the heavy cherrywood table. “Agreed.” 

 

“At least you’re nearly done, though. Only one semester left and you’re free,” Usopp pointed out, and he tried to take another drink and tough his way through it, but he cracked and finally got up to get a glass of water. Sanji smiled at him a bit, probably for his very valid attempt to appreciate fine liquor. 

 

“Very true.” 

 

The silence hung between them as Usopp sat back down, chugging his water. He wasn’t sure how to continue the conversation. He was still at a loss as to why he was even there in the first place. 

 

But Sanji was nothing if not socially graceful in his weird way when he wanted to be, and he led Usopp along through a languid conversation, easy and relaxed, and it felt normal again, and it was natural, like the very way that Sanji spoke—words flowing into each other with a certain kind of overly-smooth connection between them, his breath cushioning and softening and giving a flow to his sentences even when he was so casual with peppering his speech with expletives, and sometimes, Usopp would never admit, but sometimes, he enjoyed just listening to Sanji talk. 

 

He’d never heard him say anything in French at all, not even one word, he was pretty sure, and Usopp would’ve never known that Sanji was originally from France if he hadn’t told all of them months ago. It was pretty subtle a lot of the time. He’d do things like stress the wrong syllable, or give certain vowels a different sort of push or pull. It wasn’t much, most of the time. It was enough to know there was something different about him. 

 

Sanji’s mouth was one of his greatest assets, really. It was never idle. Cracking into smiles and surprising, sudden laughter, teeth digging into and chewing on his bottom lip, sucking on a cigarette — Sanji had developed his own wordless way of communicating on top of simply speaking. 

 

Usopp laughed along with him at the table, and they drank, and kept drinking, and Usopp realized he was being greatly outpaced. Sanji’s pale cheeks were tinted in a warmer hue now. He was smiling more, and rubbing his eyes, and nodding his head as Usopp told him about a particularly fashion-forward and enthusiastic customer who came in regularly to his coffee shop. She also happened to be a very, very senior citizen. 

 

“This lady sky dives ever Thursday, I’m not joking, she showed me pictures. She’s gotta be, like, ninety years old. I love her. I love her.” Usopp was grinning behind his drink and Sanji was smiling and finally, Usopp figured out the weird thing that was different about Sanji that night. 

 

His mouth smiled along with Usopp, but his eyes did not. 

 

“Alright. Okay, let’s—” Sanji glanced at his phone, checking the time. “Come with me upstairs.” 

 

“For what?” 

 

“Stop asking stupid questions for a minute, okay? I need to talk to you, remember? Come.” 

 

Usopp paused. “Why do you need to talk to me, though?” 

 

“Because you’re my friend, Usopp.” 

 

Ah. 

 

Usopp grabbed his glass because he saw that Sanji had his drink in his hand, and he followed Sanji up the stairs. He was all the more curious and a little confused when Sanji stopped at Usopp’s room rather than going to his own. Sanji pushed the door open and stood there, obviously waiting for Usopp to enter first. 

 

After a fair amount of hesitation, Usopp stepped into his bedroom and looked around as he left his drink sitting on his desk, and he was wondering if something was different, like maybe Sanji moved something around or added something, but no, nope, everything was as it should be, everything was totally—

 

Sanji followed him in and took another long drink of his fancy scotch, wiping his mouth with the back of his wrist, and he placed his glass, which was nearly empty again, on a stack of papers. 

 

Then he took a step towards Usopp, suddenly very much in his personal bubble, and before Usopp could ask another stupid question, Sanji dipped his head and pressed his lips against Usopp’s.

 

With a sharp inhale, Usopp stumbled back a little, but Sanji stayed right with him, hands gripping shoulders, and Usopp was tripping up against his bedroom wall, his eyebrows shot upwards and his eyes barely closed, and he kissed Sanji back out of partial shock and partial respect. Partial fear, maybe. 

 

Sanji broke them apart after just a second, just after Usopp’s head had knocked against the wall, and Usopp was breathing very heavily, words tumbling out of his mouth almost the instant they were separated. 

 

“I’m not gay?!” Usopp nearly shouted, and it sounded more like a desperate question than a statement, and Sanji snorted. 

 

“Neither am I.” 

 

“I know you’re not! Or, I thought not! But that was pretty gay, Sanji, yeah, that was e-extremely gay of you, very blatantly homosexual there, and I really like you, like as a person, but I’m not—“ 

 

“Usopp.” 

 

There was quiet between them. And Sanji still stood there, metaphorically holding him against the wall. 

 

“Yes?” The word cracked with his voice. 

 

Sanji looked at him with a very still expression on his face. He nodded towards the door and put his hands in his pockets. 

 

“Look, okay, there’s the door, it’s right there. Use it if you want to, at any time, alright. Keep in mind, though, Usopp, that this is the only time in your entire life that this will ever happen to you. Me doing this, I mean. This is it, the only opportunity. After this, there will be no more, even if you wanted it. Your only chance.” 

 

Usopp’s lips parted as he breathed, and all he could smell was cigarettes and alcohol. That was all he could taste, even. He looked at Sanji, from his blue eyes, half-concealed by big blond waves of hair that hung over his face, messy and unkempt after their walk through the winter wind and snow, to his red cheeks, and his jeans that fit really, really well, seriously, where did he buy his pants, and his shoes that were too nice to be wearing in the snow, they were probably pretty ruined by now. 

 

Fuck it. 

 

Usopp grabbed Sanji by the front of his shirt, and he craned his neck forward, and he kissed him. 

 

He could feel the smile on Sanji’s lips. 

 

When Sanji’s mouth went to his throat, Usopp’s hands, which were still clenched into fists around Sanji’s nice shirt, started to relax. Usopp looked at the ceiling, and his heart, or maybe just the blood in his veins, was doing really strange things in his chest and in his stomach and in his fingertips. “God, this is weird. This is fucked up.” 

 

“Enjoy it.” Sanji’s voice vibrated against his neck, and his hands were on his hips, and his grip was strong, and not feminine at all, and this was all very, very foreign to Usopp, but Sanji was a little bit of a foreigner so maybe that was appropriate. 

 

“I will. I mean. I am?” Usopp said, and Sanji’s mouth was on his again. “This is part of the college experience, right?” Usopp spoke against his lips, and Sanji’s face was so, so close to his, his breath was on him, and all over him, and his breathy words were surrounding him, blinding him, and he wondered how drunk Sanji was right at that moment. 

 

“Sure,” Sanji said back to him, and god, Sanji’s tongue rolled against his and it was so warm and, no, it was a saturated sort of magnetic warmth, and Usopp could only succumb.

 

Because, shit, it felt good. Fuck, okay. Okay. 

 

Usopp could hear Sanji's long inhale, and he could feel it, and he could feel Sanji's fingertips along his jawline, going down his neck, their chests pressed together, and Sanji's hands were between them now, creeping to the front of Usopp's pants, tracing along the outline of his dick, fuck, and Usopp pushed his hips forward, opening his eyes just a little, unable to get anything into focus. 

 

"Shit," Usopp gasped, and his hands were on Sanji now, and Sanji's body was totally open to him, and god damn, his hands were going under Sanji's shirt, pushing it up and exposing so much skin, fuck, and Sanji was smiling and kissing him, and Usopp's fingers ran downwards and hooked around the rim of Sanji's trousers, and he pulled them closer together. 

 

Sanji's dick was hard and it was fucking rubbing up against his, and fucking, fucking shit, he was hard too, and he was grinding back against him and god damn. 

 

Usopp was breathing very, very heavily. 

 

Sanji started to pull away and Usopp bit his bottom lip, halting Sanji in place, and the look in his fucking crystal blue eyes was intimidating as hell and Usopp froze for just a second. Sanji put all his weight forward, pressing into him, still rubbing, hips rotating into him. 

 

"You're into this," Sanji said, his voice low and his lip still captured between Usopp's teeth, their mouths brushing together as he spoke, and Usopp pulled back, teeth clicking together as he released him and leaned back against the wall again. 

 

"I am not." 

 

"Me either." 

 

Usopp smiled a little and Sanji was on him again, with fervor. 

 

Sanji's hands ran up his chest and over the tops of his shoulders, along his throat, thumbs pressing up against the curve of his jaw, and Usopp's fingers curled around Sanji's wrists and slid down his forearms. 

 

With Sanji's tongue in his mouth again, hot and wet and fucking alluring as hell, Usopp accidentally moaned, and he knew that was it, he was fucking done—he'd just _bit the man's lip_ for Christ's sake, okay, whatever, he was... he was drunk. 

 

Sanji pulled away, very suddenly, and he dropped to a squat, face-level with Usopp's crotch. 

 

"Are you—" 

 

Sanji yanked down Usopp's pants—fucking elastic waistbands—and Usopp's shoulder blades were digging into the wall as Sanji pulled his black boxer-briefs down over exposed thighs and, okay, his dick was totally out in the open and fucking throbbing. 

 

"You have a big dick."

 

"Why're you so surpri—Jesus _Christ!_ "

 

Sanji gripped him and slid his tongue along the bottom of his dick, from the base to the tip, and he looked up at Usopp, his tongue flattening against the head of his cock, and he fucking smiled at him, just like that, mouth hanging open, and Usopp had to press his thumb and his forefinger into his eyes for a moment. He took a deep breath and craned his neck back with his eyes still shut because god damn, this was fucking him up. 

 

Sanji put his weight on his knees and curled his lips around Usopp's cock and slid his hand up and down, mouth following close behind, and he hummed as his other hand squeezed Usopp's thigh. 

 

Usopp's knees almost buckled, and he steadied himself by grabbing a fistful of Sanji's hair, and Sanji _moaned_ around his dick. Usopp looked down and watched as his roommate stretched his neck forward until his nose was up against his goddamn pelvis, and his felt his cock slide down Sanji's throat, and he fucking swallowed around it, and Usopp's voice caught on every exhale. Every breath was heaving, and he rolled his hips forward, and both of Sanji's hands were gripping tight around his waist, thumbs pressing hard into him, and Usopp was almost shuddering. 

 

He felt—heard—Sanji gag, and he pulled back, but shit, Sanji stayed with him, still moaning, a hand tracing up his stomach, half of his face wet by now. 

 

Usopp could feel Sanji's teeth dragging gently along, just barely there, tongue curling along the underside of his cock, and Usopp's hips bucked and he lurched forward a bit, pulling hard on Sanji's hair, and he tried to speak in a steady voice, but he fucking couldn't. 

 

"Sanji, I—"

 

Sanji pulled back, the wet suction making a popping sound, and with his lips still against the head of Usopp's cock, he said, "I'm fine with that." 

 

And around his dick, Sanji made those, fuck, those noises that gave Usopp goosebumps and made his stomach feel warm, like Sanji was fucking savoring it, his eyes closed, and Usopp came down the back of his throat a minute later and didn't mean to cry out, but he did, and he cursed a lot, and his head fell back against the wall as Sanji sat back. 

 

Sanji wiped his mouth and the rest of his face with his sleeve, although Usopp hardly saw him, his eyes mostly closed. He stood and Usopp watched him approach the abandoned scotch he'd left on his homework and down the rest of the glass, dabbing his lips once more with his other sleeve. 

 

Hardcore. 

 

He went to Usopp's bed and threw himself down on it, taking a deep breath. 

 

"Thank you for that. I feel much better." 

 

Several seconds passed between them. 

 

He didn't know why, but Usopp got the strangest feeling that Sanji might start crying. 

 

"I, uh..." Usopp watched him there, lying on his back with his eyes closed, and he pulled his pants back up a bit clumsily and slid down the wall until he was sitting on the floor. "You're welcome?" 

 

Sanji snorted. 

 

"Am I supposed to, uh... Um." 

 

Sanji twisted his neck and looked over at Usopp, whose eyes were on the erection he still had. 

 

"Hm? Oh—no, don't worry about it. It wasn't about that." 

 

"What the fuck was that about, then?" Usopp was rubbing his face, speaking into his palms. 

 

"Don't worry about that either. I just wanted to." 

 

"You're fucked up." Usopp stated this as absolute fact. 

 

Sanji laughed a little, clearly agreeing with him. 

 

Maybe Sanji was alright. Maybe it was all in Usopp's head. But, still. What the fuck? 

 

" _I'm_ fucked up," Usopp said, a little quieter. 

 

"You are. We all are. Don't you know that?" Sanji sniffed and pushed himself up and stood, stretching, and Usopp pointedly did not look at his crotch. 

 

As he stopped by the doorway, he said, "I'm going to shower," and Usopp looked up at him, still clearly at a loss. Sanji glanced back down at him. "I'm obviously not going to cuddle you. But I do owe you." 

 

Sanji _did_ look fucked up. 

 

"You owe me?" 

 

Something probably did happen. But, probably, Usopp would never know what it was.And that was alright. It wasn't any of his business anyway. 

 

"Yeah, I owe you," Sanji confirmed. 

 

"Can I cash that in now?" 

 

Sanji folded his arms across his chest. "Maybe." 

 

"Will you say something in French?" 

 

Sanji rolled his eyes, and as he turned to leave the room, he said, so naturally, "Si jamais tu me redemandes de parler français, je vais te faire sucer ta propre queue." 

 

Usopp grinned. "What'd you say?" 

 

"That you're cute." 

 

"No you didn't." 

 

"Nah, I didn't." 

 

Sanji dipped out of the room and walked down the hallway, and after a quick thought, Usopp crawled on his hands and knees, poking his head out of the doorway and calling down to him, "Hey, do you think in French?" 

 

"Parfois, oui," Sanji half-shouted back, and he slipped in the bathroom, and Usopp could hear the door lock behind him. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> we tried to write this author's note like six times and we actually can't so just. we swear it's a zosan fanfiction so just trust us just believe in us okay


	7. December (Part II)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> due to some responses from the last chapter, as well as the fact that part 1 of mnm is ending and the pace is going to really start picking up, we'd like to issue this warning to everyone:
> 
> this story will get dark at times, it will get emotional, there will be violence described in detail, there will be (at times intense) moments of anxiety and depression and dissociation and hopelessness, of things not going as planned, and in the style mnm is written, it can and possibly will be jarring at the very least for some people to read.
> 
> there will also be a lot of moments of love, of friendship, of support and determination, because that’s a huge part of this story. 
> 
> there will also be more scenes with explicit sexual content. however, the two main pairings remain frobin and zosan. additionally, there are other pairings outside of that in this story.
> 
> if this makes you uncomfortable, if you are sensitive to these sorts of things, we recommend you stop reading mnm, because it’s more important to us that you remain happy and healthy than you read this story
> 
> ultimately we are working hard to do our best with this, but it’s a story about life, and life isn’t always a happy story the entire time, and that is reflected in this fanfiction.

Well. That had been pretty different. 

 

Usopp's hands were jammed deep in his pockets as he slushed through the snow and blistering cold _once again_ , power-walking back to the party by himself. He should've grabbed a warmer coat when he was back at the Sunny. What the hell was wrong with him? 

 

What the hell was wrong with everybody, come to think of it. 

 

Back at the Sunny, Usopp had banged on the bathroom door a few minutes after he'd heard Sanji start up the shower. 

 

"You're not going back to the party, are you!" he'd shouted through the door. 

 

"Hell no!" Sanji had yelled back. 

 

"You _bastard_ ," Usopp had said very loudly, and he'd turned and, ugh, woah, head rush, he was still drunk, yeah, the stairs were a bitch, but he'd made it down them well enough and grabbed his coat and left to go _back_ to the goddamn party. Because he still had the keys to his car. And sure as shit Nami wasn't going to walk back. 

 

So, yeah, that whole experience had been fairly... Not what Usopp had been planning on doing that night. 

 

When he made it back to the huge party in the frat castle, which was still raging, god, Usopp spent about fifteen minutes just trying to find _anybody_ , and after he'd momentarily given up and went to go locate a solo cup and a keg, someone grabbed him by his wrist. 

 

"Hey, where'd you guys go! You've been gone forever!" Nami said over the music as Usopp turned around and pursed his lips together. 

 

Where did he go, shit. He wracked his brain for something to say. He was a pretty decent liar, honestly, but it was _Nami_ , so he couldn't just... Fuck. Of course she'd be the one to find him first. He was almost too drunk for this.

 

"Oh, Sanji just, uh—he wanted me to take him back to the Sunny." 

 

"What? _Why?_ " 

 

Why. Shit, because, uh, "He met some pretty girl and said this place was too crowded, so he wanted to borrow my car, but he can't drive a stick, you know, so I drove them both back there." 

 

"Really? Jeez, that was nice of you. He never brings girls back to the house!" 

 

Usopp knew this. There were lots of nights that Sanji never came home. Even more so, lately. And also, Sanji was not secretive about hitting on just about everyone, and sometimes, once in a while, when they went out together, Sanji didn't ride back home with them. But he never had guests over, in a manner of speaking. That was pretty standard Sanji behavior. Usopp had considered this detail about him. 

 

"Yeah, I know, but the house is actually empty for once, so, you know—" 

 

"Gross."

 

"Yeah. Definitely." Usopp cleared his throat. "I'm sure she'll be gone by the time we get back." 

 

Nami laughed. "God. Probably. Anyway, I found Luffy, and then I lost him again. Help me re-find him and Zoro." And with that, she linked her arm around his like she typically did when they were in a crowd and pulled him along. 

 

Usopp took a deep breath, relieved and in the clear. 

 

The rest of the party went exactly how he'd hoped it would. Lots of shouting and dancing and drinking and being sloppy as hell, and Usopp didn't have to think much about anything. Let Nami take the wheel for a while. They'd found Luffy easily enough, and eventually, after a long time, they finally ran into Zoro, who may have actually been all the way drunk. 

 

Zoro didn't say much to them. But he wasn't much of a rowdy partier. 

 

Nami agreed to drive them home, which was good, because Usopp was not sober even a little bit, nope, and he had panicked a little when they were walking out to his car, because he'd said to Nami and everyone else earlier that he'd _driven_ Sanji back home, but his car was parked in the exact same spot, shit, but Nami didn't notice, thank _god._ She was the only one he had to worry about.

 

Usopp had barely made it back to his bed once they were home. Everyone was exhausted. There was no Thousand Sunny after party. Even Luffy had just gone straight to the couch and passed right out. 

 

The next morning, Usopp squinted his eyes open and felt fucking _awful._ He should've chugged water before he fell asleep. Or eaten something. He laid in bed for ages, thinking about how horrible his mouth tasted and how he should probably just get up and get something to drink, but he wound up rolling over instead. 

 

Shit. 

 

He couldn't fall back asleep because his stupid body was hard-wired at this point to wake up this early, he _knew_ it was probably somewhere around the crack of dawn, but there was little he could do about it. Over a year of working at that little coffee shop and dragging himself out of bed at five in the morning was absolutely to blame. 

 

After a while of trying and failing to convince himself he was still sleeping, and that he wasn't awake at all, Usopp finally drug himself out of bed, more or less falling onto the floor rather than standing up. 

 

With some concentrated effort, he got himself all the way on his feet and to his bedroom door and took a deep breath and—oh _shit_ , he knew that smell. Okay. He could probably stomach Sanji's cooking. That may help. 

 

When Usopp was halfway down the stairs, he paused, his brain suddenly being flooded with memories from last night that had apparently failed to register when he was first waking up. 

 

He and Sanji had come back to the Sunny. Oh yeah. 

 

And then... 

 

Usopp stared down at the shitty carpeting on their stairs—the only place in that house to actually have any carpeting, oddly enough—and tried to figure out what in the _hell_ that was. That whole... Jesus, he had _kissed_ Sanji, he had... 

 

Usopp abruptly sat down on the stairs. 

 

Was that a normal thing that happened with people? Usopp had always been kind of a loner, he didn't have a lot of friends growing up, which was fair, he was kind of obnoxious when he was younger—but no, did people do that in college? Usopp was in his twenties and he'd really only slept with one person his whole life, and really, before living at the Sunny, he never _drank_ that much in his life, and he didn't really know where the hell to go from here, shit. 

 

Did he fuck up? Did he make a really stupid, idiot mistake, like he was fucking prone to doing, and ruin one of the very few friendships he'd managed to maintain for a while? 

 

Usopp stood up and walked down the rest of the stairs, because there was really only one way to proceed, and that was forward. 

 

When he got downstairs, it looked like Sanji was just finishing up, and he'd cooked a _shitload, awesome_ , and he didn't even really notice Usopp slowly approaching the counter/bar. 

 

"Good morning," Usopp said tentatively, clearing his throat a little, and Sanji whipped around to face him, a lit cigarette between his lips. 

 

"Oh—morning, shithead. You sleep well?" 

 

Usopp nodded a little, eyes trailing down to the feast right in front of him, and Sanji slid a plate into his line of vision, and he took it without hesitation. "I slept well enough. I didn't barf." 

 

"Proud of you." 

 

"Yeah," Usopp looked back up at Sanji in between filling his plate with lots and lots of food and man, Sanji had made everything extra greasy, like the man just _knew_ how bad everyone would need it. "Did you sleep alright?" 

 

"Like a fucking log." 

 

Usopp looked away from Sanji again and turned to go back to the table. That'd been an obvious lie. 

 

Sanji's eyes were bloodshot and his voice was scratchy and hoarse, and he looked _worse_ than he had the previous night, which was impressive. Usopp was used to Sanji looking pretty put together. So it was all the more evident. 

 

Leaving his plate at the cherrywood table, Usopp wandered to the fridge to find something to drink—chug—and he watched Sanji from the corner of his eye. With clearly little interest, Sanji grabbed a single piece of toast, spreading some kind of jelly on it, and he walked back to the table and put out his cigarette and took one bite, and then he dropped the piece of toast back on his plate and rubbed his eyes. 

 

Usopp closed the fridge once he had a bottle of water, because that was probably the smartest thing to drink at the moment. 

 

"So," Usopp said as he slid back into his seat at the table across from Sanji, pointedly not making direct eye contact, as that was a little much at the moment, "do you have any plans for the day?" 

 

"I work at, uh... fuck, five," Sanji said, talking more to his toast than to Usopp. "Not looking forward to it." 

 

"Yeah, I wouldn't be either. Well, it's pretty early, isn't it?" 

 

"As hell." 

 

"I haven't even looked at the time," Usopp said, eating slowly. His body _hurt_ , like he was sore, and all his joints felt stiff. It was still better than throwing up, though. 

 

"I haven't either." 

 

"Well. You probably have a while left to sleep. Er, sleep _more_ , I mean. You look like you need it," Usopp said, pushing a sausage link around his plate. 

 

Sanji snorted and took another bite of his toast, setting it back down on his plate again. "Do I? I could probably sleep for a month, I think." 

 

So. This whole conversation was pretty... normal. Normal enough. It wasn't _awkward_ , anyway, so that was a win in Usopp's book. 

 

Okay. Cool. 

 

Usopp didn't say much else for a minute, because he was too goddamn tired, and because it was hard to get complete thoughts through his foggy brain. There was just Sanji there, talking to him like nothing had changed, and that was nice, that was a relief, but there was also the whole issue of Sanji looking like shit and clearly being bothered over _something_ , and Usopp was about to just outright ask what the hell was going on, but he stopped when he heard the sound of heavy clunking shoes coming down the stairs. 

 

Sanji also heard it, apparently, and he looked over at the stairwell for just a second. And then he stood up suddenly, and he pushed his plate with half a piece of toast to Usopp and said, "Finish this," and walked straight over to the couch and grabbed his jacket that was draped over the back of it. 

 

"Where are you going?" Usopp asked. 

 

"Anywhere," Sanji mumbled as he walked past him, pushing his arms through his jacket sleeves, and Usopp didn't say anything as Sanji slipped out the front door while Zoro came down the stairs, yawning loudly. 

 

Usopp pushed more food around his plate and waited. 

 

It took a moment of Zoro still waking up to notice all the food on the counter/bar, and once he saw it, he looked over at Usopp, and then around at the otherwise empty room. 

 

"Where's... you know what, never mind, I don't care," Zoro said in his husky morning voice, and he loaded up his plate and sat down across from Usopp, where Sanji had just been a minute ago. 

 

Usopp took a bite of the toast Sanji had commanded him to finish and considered a few things. 

 

"You're up early," Usopp said with his mouth full, reaching for his bottle of water that was already about finished. 

 

"I don't get it either," Zoro replied, stabbing a bunch of hash browns with his fork. 

 

"Are you not hungover at all?" 

 

Zoro shook his head some. "Not really." 

 

"Are you some kind of superhuman that doesn't get drunk?" Usopp asked, because honestly, it sort of seemed that way. 

 

"Fucking got drunk last night," Zoro grumbled, making a face at his hash browns. 

 

"Oh yeah? I didn't know that was even possible for you. What prompted that?" 

 

Zoro looked back up at Usopp, and Usopp struggled to deal with the initial shock of how intense Zoro could be sometimes. 

 

"Nothing." 

 

Okay, it was nothing, jeez. 

 

Usopp let his eyes drift around the room, trying to mentally move on from that, and then he suddenly said, "Didn't Luffy pass out on the couch last night?" 

 

"He's gone." 

 

"Gone?" 

 

"Around, I dunno, maybe six this morning, I heard his phone go off about twenty times. Then I heard his little scooter pulling out. And then I passed back out." 

 

Usopp wrinkled his nose. "What were you doing awake at six in the morning?" 

 

"His goddamn phone woke me up," Zoro replied, obviously annoyed over the whole thing. 

 

Maybe that's why Zoro was in a mood. Or maybe not. 

 

Usopp frowned. Maybe he was being paranoid. Most likely. 

 

Zoro didn't say a whole lot else, but in all honesty, Usopp really valued the comfortable silences he and Zoro could slip into. And it was too early to talk much. And Usopp was getting a weird, intense vibe off Zoro, and he wasn't touching that one. 

 

So Usopp finished his breakfast and washed his plate and trudged back up the stairs. And then he stood there in the middle of the hallway, looking back and forth between his room and Nami’s.

 

He went and collapsed back onto his own bed. 

 

And then he laid there, awake, for another half hour. 

 

Fuck. What the hell was going on. 

 

Unless Usopp was going crazy, and he was pretty sure that, now that he was sober, he was _not_ crazy—he was pretty sure that Sanji was losing his shit over something. That was pretty obvious at this point, it was easy to see just by _looking_ at him, and that was probably where the whole... string of events that occurred last night came from, knowing Sanji. It'd make a lot of sense, when Usopp put the pieces in order. Sanji wasn't the type to have a long talk and hug it out—rather, he was more like the kind of person that blamed himself and self-destructed. 

 

And Zoro was in a... funk, maybe. But that could've been anything. Weird, though, because Zoro had seemed pretty happy lately. School stuff was going well for him, for once, it seemed. Maybe Zoro and Sanji had a big serious fight. Lover's quarrel. 

 

Usopp snorted. Well that would be about par for the course, wouldn't it. 

 

Luffy was gone again, and who knew when the hell he'd come back. Was nobody ever going to bring that up? Usopp had mentioned it once, ages ago, maybe in August or September, and Luffy had avoided the question. Usopp had cooked up about a thousand scenarios for Luffy's secret double life. Every time Luffy left like that, Usopp imagined him running off to be an FBI agent, or a mob boss, and everything in between. But apparently nobody was going to outright find out what Luffy did. 

 

So. Okay, fine. 

 

And then there was Nami, and out of everyone, she was the most blatant to Usopp. He could see the stress in her face, and he could hear the exhaustion in her voice, and with how often she was gone, coming home way late most nights—Usopp knew her work schedule, and he knew she didn't work _that_ goddamn much. Not that late in the night. So what the hell? 

 

Usopp took a deep breath and figured he should probably file all of this under the "None of Your Business" category in his mind. 

 

They were his friends. The first group of friends he'd ever had, really. He'd always wanted something like this, growing up. He'd wanted to feel included, and like he was part of something, like he had a family. He would watch other kids with their friends and wonder what it was like to be a part of something like that. And so, even after only... jeez, what, four or five months, he'd grown so _attached_ to those idiots. And he wanted to help them. Because they seemed like they needed it. But he had absolutely no idea how to go about doing that. 

 

Usopp wished there was a schematic for friendship.

 

He wondered how Chopper was doing. 

 

He stared at the ceiling, re-counted all the tiles for the trillionth time, and he sighed because he couldn't fucking fall back asleep. 

 

He sat up, threw his blanket back, grabbed his pillow, and walked straight across the hall and into Nami's room. 

 

Holding his breath, and he didn't know why he was trying to be so quiet because she wasn't the lightest of sleepers, Usopp gently clicked her door closed and walked over to her bed and pushed her blankets into a big pile on top of her and fell down next to her, laying on his back and re-acquainting himself with her ceiling tiles. She had eight more than he did.  

 

After a couple seconds, she rolled over and threw all her heavy blankets back onto him—ugh, they were too hot, he didn't know how she could sleep like that—and she tossed her arm over his chest and wiggled over until her head was in its spot right under where his collarbone met his shoulder, and her hair was all up in his face, and he sighed and closed his eyes again. 

 

He could kind of feel his arm already starting to fall asleep beneath her, and he took a deep breath, and you know, he didn't care—he didn't care about his arm or the too-hot blankets or anything else, really, and that was probably what he was starting to get addicted to. When he was with her, all the other shit—it didn't matter, and he didn't care, not even a little, like all that anxiety and that general feeling of "oh fuck" just slipped away, and he opened his eyes and looked back up at the ceiling and said, "You're my best fucking friend." 

 

Nami's voice was muffled and scratchy as she mumbled, "Same." 

 

Usopp shut his eyes again and smiled and thought about how he wished he could freeze time and not change anything and soak this up as long as he could, indefinitely, because this shit was never permanent. 

 

He fell asleep before he could finish another thought on the matter. 

 

Against his deepest wishes, the days slipped by him. 

 

And wasn't that always the case with vacations. 

 

Usopp hadn't even realized it was Christmas until the day was halfway over with. He'd spent most of it with Zoro. Luffy, Nami, and Sanji were all gone that day. 

 

And when Chopper had come back in town, Usopp had picked him up from the train station and asked him a hundred questions and never really left him alone. Apparently Usopp had missed him a little. 

 

The house was empty when they made it back home, and Usopp had followed Chopper into his room and kept on yapping until he was finally kicked out over Chopper being super tired from traveling and probably also listening to Usopp yammer on. 

 

Damn it.

 

The Sunny _felt_ empty, and likewise, Usopp did too, a little bit. 

 

He hadn't envisioned their winter break to be very much like this at all. 

 

The day before New Year's Eve—New Year's Eve Eve?—Usopp sat with Nami in her room, both of them on her floor with her laptop sitting on the single desk chair in the room, and they were watching some shitty movie they'd picked on a whim on the internet, and they were absolutely surrounded by Chinese food. 

 

They got _way_ more than they should've. Whoops. 

 

Well, they couldn't help it—they'd both decided that they wanted Chinese food. And not Chinese food prepared by some five-star chef; they wanted crappy Chinese food with extra soy sauce and MSG. So they'd decided to secretly get some take-out, and not let Sanji find out, and once they started ordering, they'd accidentally just sort of... panicked and added everything they could think of onto their order. 

 

"Oh, we should get rangoons. Oh—and egg rolls, also. I don't know, a large?" 

 

"And pot stickers, we have to get those." 

 

"Oh, and, uh, like, a half-order of lo mein?" 

 

"Please can we get the sesame chicken, _please._ " 

 

It went on like that for a minute. 

 

They didn't talk about how much it cost them. 

 

So they sat there, a feast of Chinese food that they were going to have to figure out how to hide in the back of the fridge because there was no way they were going to come close to finishing, and Usopp was goddamn _content._

 

"Open your fortune," Nami said to him, throwing him his allotted Chinese fortune cookie. 

 

"I can't. I didn't finish everything. It doesn't come true if you don't finish your entire meal," Usopp informed her as the cookie hit him in the face. 

 

"Oh, shut up and open it," Nami replied, already cracking hers open. 

 

Usopp looked down at the cookie in his lap and sighed really loudly at her blatant disregard for fortune cookie law and opened it. 

 

_All things come to him who goes after them._  

 

He chewed on his bottom lip as he read it. And then he looked up at Nami and—

 

"What's yours say?" she asked. 

 

"You can't read it or it won't come true." 

 

"Okay, no, I know for a fact that you can have other people read it. You just can't say it _aloud_." 

 

Usopp was about to explain that, no, she was obviously getting her fortune cookie lies from someone spreading false information, but before he could, she leaned forward and snatched his fortune from his hands. 

 

He watched Nami read it with her head dipped down, frowning at it, like she wasn't pleased with it, and she mumbled, "This isn't even a _fortune,_ it's like a dumb proverb."

 

"Will you convince everyone to be together for New Year's Eve?" 

 

Nami looked up at Usopp suddenly with a ridiculous expression on her face. 

 

"Uh, what?" 

 

Fuck, that wasn't how Usopp wanted to approach that question. But honestly, he'd been thinking about it for a few days. Just. He had meant to ask her in a much better way instead of suddenly blurting it out after being inspired by a goddamn fortune cookie. 

 

"Well, it's just that, uh—" Usopp felt his face growing red, and he wasn't trying to _be like this_ , because it was Nami of all people, and he could probably tell her just about anything, so what the hell, god, why was this so difficult, "—I've noticed that, um, well, everyone's been gone a lot lately, you know?" 

 

Nami sat and stared and waited for him to continue, and shit, he was doing his best not to flounder. 

 

"And, I mean, I'm not trying to get into that right now—I just mean that I think that it'd be, uh, nice if we were all together. For New Year's. Chopper's back now and we haven't all done something together in, uh... a while. I mean, I know there was that big party—" 

 

"Yeah, that party was kind of nuts, anyway. Too many people." 

 

"Agreed." Usopp's memory drifted back to the party in question. "That party was fucked up." 

 

"Was it? Why?" Nami asked. 

 

Usopp cleared his throat. "Er. No reason—the point here is that we all haven't done a thing in a while, and so, uh. We should. So you should convince everyone to do something together." 

 

Nami furrowed her brow a bit. "Why me?" 

 

Breaking eye contact, Usopp shrugged. "I think you're the only one that can get everyone to go." 

 

Nami seemed to consider this for a moment. "You're probably right, honestly." She smiled at him. "Okay." 

 

Luffy had been easy to convince. Well, it wasn't like they even had convince him of anything. But they'd gone to him first, and he'd told the both of them that Law was having people over, so that settled it. Law's frat worked well. That creepo tended to keep things more on the down-low. 

 

So next was Chopper, and with Luffy added to Team Peer Pressure, he caved easily enough. 

 

"Then that only leaves Zoro and Sanji," Nami had said as she stood with Usopp and Luffy outside of Chopper's bedroom. Both Luffy and Nami had their hands on their hips, contemplating their course of action, and Usopp was deeply amused that they both had the innate feeling that this would be a bit of a challenge. 

 

"I'll just tell Zoro he should go when he gets home from work tonight," Luffy decided. 

 

Luffy had always been a man of little planning. 

 

Usopp was a little surprised that Nami was fine with that, honestly. But leave it to her to have it all figured out already. 

 

The three of them passed the time by watching Luffy's newest additions to his documentary collection, and Usopp and Nami caved and told Luffy about all their Chinese food just because they knew he'd help them get rid of the evidence before Sanji could even get home.

 

And they were correct, because when Sanji walked through the front door past one in the morning, there were several empty boxes of Chinese food safely out of sight in the trash. 

 

"Sanji!" Nami perked up from her spot on the couch, and he immediately turned all his attention towards her. 

 

"Yes!" 

 

"Come watch these documentaries with us," she said, scooting to the side of the couch and making room between herself and Usopp. Luffy grinned at Sanji from his spot on the love seat. 

 

Sanji looked so damn tired. 

 

His smile was forced. 

 

"Let me get out of this gross uniform first," he said. 

 

Sanji ended up grabbing one of his bottles of wine from the corner cabinet in the kitchen, and he shared it with the rest of them while they wasted time, and Nami kept Sanji engaged. It was subtle, but Usopp could see it plain as day. She kept asking his opinion on things, and nudging him with her elbow, and basically keeping him _awake_ and on that couch as they marathoned Luffy's documentaries through the night. 

 

It was funny to watch the struggle between Sanji desperately wanting to pass out but also wanting very much to eat up all the attention Nami was feeding him.

 

Usopp could relate. 

 

When Zoro finally got home from his overnight shift of toy store shelf stocking, Luffy wasted no time. 

 

"Zoro!" 

 

Zoro raised his eyebrows as he stood in the doorway, pulling his gloves off his hands. He probably hadn't expected so many of them to still be awake. 

 

"Yeah?" 

 

"Come to the New Year's Eve party with us!" Luffy almost shouted. 

 

Zoro snorted and walked past them and into the kitchen, towards the fridge. 

 

"Oh yeah—Sanji, you should go with us!" Nami said with her sweetest smile, leaning into him hard, bringing her nearly-empty glass of wine to her lips. 

 

Sanji looked down at Nami, almost a little frozen. "Er—a party?" 

 

"Yeah, we're all going for New Years Eve tomorrow night," Nami replied, practically resting her chin on his shoulder. "You should definitely go." 

 

"Um. Uh, yeah—" his voice cracked, "—I can probably go." 

 

" _Probably?_ " 

 

"Well, I was going to go somewhere, but, I mean, if you're going to be there and—" 

 

"Zoro!" Luffy cut in, raising his voice above everyone else. Usopp looked over the back of the couch at Zoro, who was in the middle of rolling his eyes and cracking open his beer. "You have to come with us!" 

 

Zoro almost laughed. "No." 

 

"Why _not!_ " Luffy was not pleased with Zoro's answer in the slightest. "We're all going to be there, even Chopper."

 

Zoro sat down on one of the metal stools. "I see that. I just don't want to." He took a drink of his beer while Luffy frowned at him. "You all like going out more than me." 

 

"But it's _New Year's Eve_ ," Luffy insisted, like that really mattered, balling his hands into frustrated fists. 

 

Nami twisted and looked straight at Zoro from over the back of the couch. 

 

"Is it because Sanji's going?" 

 

Usopp pursed his lips together, and he didn't know exactly why he held his breath all of the sudden, but the brief pause in conversation after Nami said that was _heavy_.

 

"I—" Zoro wrinkled his nose at Nami. "No. I don't care what that idiot does." 

 

Sanji lit a cigarette and kept his eyes on the documentary, his face totally neutral, and Usopp didn't say a fucking word. 

 

"So you don't have a good reason not to go," Nami concluded. 

 

"I _just said_ I don't _want_ —" 

 

"Don't be an asshole, Zoro," Nami interrupted. 

 

"Yeah!" Luffy yelled, backing her up immediately, and Usopp could see Nami smiling a little as he echoed, "Don't be an _asshole_ , Zoro." 

 

Zoro glared straight death at the both of them and there was no way Usopp could do what those two were doing at that moment. 

 

"Fine," he grumbled, and Luffy cheered and Nami grinned at him and flipped back around in her seat. Usopp couldn't help but smile at their victory. Sanji didn't say anything. 

 

A little later, when Usopp and Nami were upstairs brushing their teeth together in the bathroom, Usopp had said, "Man, you killed it. They all said they'd go." 

 

"Of course they did," Nami said, spitting into the sink. 

 

"Why'd you do that, though?" Usopp asked, reaching for the little glass they kept in there and filling it with water. 

 

"Do what?" 

 

"The thing with asking Zoro if it was about Sanji." 

 

Nami took the glass from him and rinsed. Once her mouth was clear and her teeth were all sparkly clean, she said, "With the way he's been lately, I didn't think he'd go unless I backed him into a corner. And an easy way to do that is with Sanji." 

 

Usopp tapped his chin. "Interesting. They're like the two sides of a magnet." 

 

"Ooh, great analogy, Usopp." 

 

"Thank you, Nami." 

 

She smiled at him and he grinned back and they made their way, finally, to bed. 

 

And the next night, at the party... God, the party. 

 

"Trafanta!" 

 

When they arrived at Law's frat, Luffy had jumped out of the car, bounce-jogging to the front porch where Law was leaned back on one of the patio chairs they kept there. The way he was so casual in his posture, it was like he seemingly didn't even feel the biting cold as he sat there with a bottle of liquor and what was probably a joint because Usopp was pretty sure that the soon-to-be Dr. Trafruitloop wasn't a cigarette kind of guy. 

 

"Luffy," Law had said in his creep-silk voice, not bothering to get up as Luffy bounded up the stairs and stood in front of him, grinning, and Law handed Luffy the bottle as the rest of them trudged up to the porch. Rather than a decent greeting, Law had just looked up at them and said, "Luffy's friends." 

 

"Yeah, I brought the whole crew!" 

 

"Nice to see you, too, you fucking weirdo," Sanji said as he walked past, opening the front door to the loud music and laughter inside. 

 

"Please," Law said as he raised a hand, waving it airily and widening his eyes at nothing, "make yourselves at home." 

 

Usopp followed Sanji inside, trailed by the rest of them, and the party was... well, pretty ideal, really. 

 

It wasn't full of drunken hoards of people. There were a decent number of people there, yeah, but they were actually mostly all people Usopp had met at least once or twice. Like some of the guys in Law's frat—Shachi and Penguin and Bepo and all them. And plenty of other familiar faces, too, and it was kind of funny how social circles overlapped sometimes. 

 

Usopp realized that all the tenants of the Thousand Sunny probably made up their own little circle, with the way people recognized them as a group. 

 

It was a good feeling. 

 

After only a few minutes of being there, Usopp started gravitating towards Nami, just out of habit, and then he stopped, momentarily conflicted with that insecure feeling of "am I the annoying friend that shadows people at parties?" until she grabbed his wrist and pulled him along downstairs, and she pushed him into a chair at a table of people playing a drinking game, and okay, okay, it was Nami, don't be stupid. 

 

Nami and, through her tutelage, Usopp were both pretty damn good at drinking games when they teamed up together. 

 

Damn good in the sense that they were intentionally awful at all the right moments for a while and drank as much free alcohol as they could in a short amount of time. And they were also really good at stumbling away from the table half an hour later, with Usopp well on his way to piss drunk and Nami clearly pretty tipsy, arm in arm. 

 

"Did you know," Usopp said as they pulled each other back up the stairs, intent on finding their other roommates for some reason—they'd just suddenly decided that was their new goal, "that before I met you, I'd only been drunk, uh... not that many times. Like ten? Maybe? Or five, I don't know." 

 

Nami laughed. "Where's the fun in that?" 

 

"True, I have learned this. You are my most fun friend, definitely," Usopp said, nodding to himself over the revelation. Before the Thousand Sunny, Usopp didn't really... _live_ a whole lot. And now, he felt like he was along for the ride. And he liked that feeling. 

 

"You're my..." Nami looked at him, pausing on the stairs and leaning against the railing. "You're my, uh..." 

 

"Am I not your most fun friend, wow, thanks a _lot,_ " Usopp scoffed, walking past her, and she grabbed him by the back of his shirt. 

 

"No! I mean. It's just hard to fit you into a single word right now." 

 

Usopp turned and she smiled a little and, god, all was forgiven forever. 

 

Back upstairs, they found Chopper and Sanji and Luffy sitting with Law and a few of Law's frat buddies, and Sanji looked pissed. 

 

Upon approaching the table where they were all sitting, they found Sanji leaned back hard in his chair, an ankle over his other knee, and he had his wallet out and looked miserable. 

 

"Sanji, I feel like it's your fault, at this point," Chopper was saying, and Luffy laughed. 

 

" _He's_ the asshole making all these stupid fucking bets!" Sanji shouted at Chopper, reaching for a bottle of beer. 

 

"You're the one that keeps taking them, though!" Chopper returned, and Sanji gave him a nasty look. 

 

"Normal people shouldn't be able to do the things this fuckface is doing," Sanji almost growled at Chopper. 

 

"So?" Law asked, interrupting them, and Sanji's eyes snapped to Law's. "Five dollars says I can bend a cigarette to a ninety degree angle without breaking it." 

 

Sanji leaned in his seat and dug out his pack and pulled a single cigarette from it, almost glaring at the thing, and he flexed it a little and chewed on his lip. 

 

"Don't do it, Sanji," Chopper warned. 

 

"Yeah, if Trafundraiser says he can do it, he can _totally_ do it," Luffy added, sitting right next to Law, almost bouncing in his seat. 

 

Sanji looked from them back to his cigarette, and he bent it a little and ended up snapping it almost immediately, and he hung his head and muttered a string of curses to himself, tossing his broken cigarette on the table.  

 

Usopp glanced over at Law, who was quite possibly on the brink of a very knowing smirk. 

 

"Fine!" Sanji shouted suddenly, looking up, and he threw his pack of cigarettes at Law. "Do it, just fucking do it, I know you can, just take my five dollars and show me how." 

 

Law actually caught the pack and took one cigarette from it, throwing it right back at Sanji, who didn't do as good of a job at catching it. 

 

Usopp could feel Nami lean on him and whisper, "Have you figured out how to do it yet?" 

 

He rubbed his mouth while he watched Law fish in his pocket for something. Usopp was a little drunk to be thinking about this sort of shit. He couldn't do riddles right now. 

 

Law pulled a lighter from his pocket. And then he took Sanji's cigarette and pressed the end of the paper side against his tongue and held it there for a second. 

 

Sanji gave him a very clear "what the fuck are you doing, you creep weirdo jackoff?" look. 

 

Usopp had gotten pretty good at reading Sanji's facial expressions over the past few months, with how many times Sanji had just given him _looks_ instead of outright saying things. It was a pretty effective form of communication, honestly.

 

After the tip of the cigarette was all wet with Law's spit, he turned it around and stuck the filtered end in his mouth, like a normal person, and took a minute to light it. It was wet, so clearly, it took a moment, and—oh! 

 

"Moisture does it," Usopp said under his breath in Nami's ear, and she nodded. 

 

"You got it." 

 

Law took a few long and slow drags off the cigarette and pulled it from his lips, and then, very slowly, using both hands and being very gentle, he started bending it right in the middle. And true to his word, the cigarette didn't break at all. 

 

Sanji looked _pissed._  

 

Once he was finished, Law took one more drag off it, which looked pretty hilarious, him smoking a cigarette bent at a total right angle like that, and he said to Sanji, "You owe me five dollars." 

 

Sanji stood up abruptly, counting out five singles from his wallet as he said, "You're an asshole, and you're too fucking tall, and your name is stupid, and you can take your dumbass bar tricks and fuck yourself with them." He dropped the money on the table and grabbed his beer and walked past Usopp and Nami, towards the back door, shaking a new cigarette from his pack. 

 

Law came _very_ close to actually laughing as he stubbed the cigarette out in the nearest ashtray and pocketed his money. 

 

"Your name really _is_ stupid," Luffy said in conclusion after Sanji stormed off, and Law quickly turned his head and narrowed his eyes at him. Luffy raised his shoulders at Law in an over-exaggerated shrug. "I've known you for years and I don't even know your first name!" 

 

"It's Tra _falga—"_

 

"Yeah, you keep _saying that_ , but that still doesn't really tell me what it _is_." 

 

"I..." Law looked as flabbergasted as a person could manage to appear, really. 

 

Nami slid into Sanji's vacated seat, and Usopp hesitated. And then he made a quick decision and spun on his heel, opting to follow Sanji outside to the front porch.

 

When the cold air hit him, Sanji turned, and he yanked his cigarette from his mouth upon seeing Usopp and said, very loudly, "That was utter bullshit, right?" 

 

Usopp nodded, letting the front door swing closed behind him. "Oh, definitely." He paused. "Well, actually, it really wasn't bullshit—Law pulled moisture through the cigarette, which made it more bendy. It makes sense, really. Pretty smart, when you think about it." 

 

Sanji _glared_ at him. 

 

"I mean," Usopp looked around, anywhere other than Sanji, "it was _total_ bullshit, fuck that guy." 

 

He could hear the hard exhale of Sanji's breath as he laughed just a little and said, "You're an idiot. Why the hell did you follow me out here? It's freezing." 

 

Usopp had a definitive reason for following Sanji outside, but instead, he shuffled his feet and said, "Oh, I dunno. Nami took your seat and I was standing awkwardly so I sort of just walked away. And I have no idea where Zoro is. So. Here I am." 

 

Sanji visibly stiffened and then relaxed, and he plunked his beer down on the snowy porch railing, and he absently flicked his cigarette a few times in a row while he stared at the ground. And then he pitched it into the yard and pulled his wallet from his back pocket, and he opened it and pulled out what could only be a joint. 

 

"Want to smoke this with me?" 

 

"Sure." 

 

This could work in Usopp's favor. 

 

They stood and passed the joint back and forth, and Usopp watched the snow fall in the light of the streetlamp at the end of the yard, and he got pretty goddamn stoned pretty fast, wow.

 

He waved his hand when Sanji offered it to him again. He needed to concentrate. He'd gone out there and stood in the freezing cold for a reason, after all.He took a deep breath and said, "Sanji."

 

"Usopp." 

 

"Are you okay?" Usopp looked over at Sanji, finally, and Sanji didn't look back at him. Instead, he watched the street, where Usopp's eyes had just been. 

 

"I'm fine." 

 

"Are you sure?" 

 

Sanji snorted. "I'm sure." 

 

"It's just that you've been gone _so much_ , and, uh, lately, you've been looking pretty... sleep-deprived, I guess, and, I don't know, you—"

 

Sanji spoke over him, halting his momentum and his speech in place. 

 

"Don't read too much into shit that doesn't mean anything." 

 

Usopp closed his mouth and let his eyes fall. 

 

"Sorry." 

 

"What the hell are you _sorry_ for—" 

 

"Well what else am I supposed to be? You're acting so fucked up lately—you all are, actually—and everyone says it's nothing, it's always _nothing_ with you guys, so what the hell!" Usopp shouted suddenly, and then he pursed his lips together and curled them inwards, biting down, because whoops. 

 

Sanji took a slow rip from his joint, looking like he was considering Usopp's words, and after taking a deep breath and exhaling very slowly, he said, "Everything's fine on my end, so don't worry about it." 

 

Usopp's shoulders fell. 

 

"Alright, fine." 

 

Sanji offered Usopp his joint one more time, and this time, Usopp took it. 

 

"Go worry about Nami," Sanji said, and he sounded fairly sincere about it. 

 

Usopp raised his eyebrows. "Nami?" 

 

"You and I both know shit's going on with her." 

 

"Well. Yeah." 

 

Sanji lit a new cigarette and frowned back out at the street. "She's more important, anyway." 

 

Usopp didn't say anything, partially because he was high and he couldn't find the words, but mostly because, deep down, he agreed. 

 

"Anything that can bother someone like Nami for more than a minute," Sanji continued after a few seconds, "must be something significant." 

 

There was a lot of truth there. Usopp took a final hit of Sanji's weed and handed it back, and he shoved his hands, which were completely numb, into his pockets. "I will. I mean. You're right, I'll try to talk to her." 

 

"Good." Sanji gave him one of those crooked grins that made him look like the goddamn delinquent he was, and Usopp wanted to laugh at how quick he could flip on that switch. Sanji clapped him on the shoulder, and his grip was so strong, and he rattled Usopp back and forth as he said, "I leave our most beautiful and perfect roommate and friend in your very capable hands, Usopp." 

 

"Thanks?" 

 

"I believe in you." 

 

Usopp rolled his eyes. "I'm going inside. Stay out here and freeze." 

 

"Will do," Sanji said as he took a drag of his cigarette, still holding his mostly-finished and still-smoking joint in his other hand. 

 

Usopp pushed the front door open, and as he walked back to go find Nami and everyone else, he replayed Sanji's words in his head. Either way, he'd fully intended to talk to Nami about what the hell was going on, whether Sanji wanted him to or not. But now, fuck, it felt like he had an obligation. 

 

Well. He _did_ have an obligation, didn't he. He was her friend. 

 

Usopp couldn't find her at first. He couldn't find anyone, actually. Everyone in that house was starting to get a bit drunker, a bit more rowdy, the closer to midnight it got. He nabbed a bottle of Blue Moon from an orphaned six-pack sitting on a countertop as he made his way to the stairs.

 

He found Chopper with Zoro upstairs, sitting at a table, the two of them being cheered on as they chugged their beers. Zoro finished way before Chopper, and he slapped Chopper on the back in congratulations when he finally managed to drink his entire drink, and Chopper nearly fell out of his chair. 

 

Usopp smiled and moved on. 

 

When he finally did find Nami downstairs, she was surrounded. By a lot of guys. Tall, good-looking guys. And that was pretty normal, honestly. She was so pretty. And her smile was, like... it was so bright. And she was good at being the center of attention. She was one of those people that had that sort of natural magnetism. People were drawn to her. 

 

Usopp stood back and drank his beer and watched her. He couldn't really help it. He liked looking at her. 

 

She noticed him, though, standing way back there, past tons of people, and she straight up walked away from the conversation that she was probably the subject of, leaving all those guys standing there super awkwardly, unsure of how to react to her abandonment. 

 

"Usopp! I was looking for your earlier! You just disappeared, so I—look what this nice person named... Brian? Ryan? I don't know, but he gave me this _whole bottle_ ," Nami grinned, holding up a full, unopened fifth of vodka, and Usopp's stomach kind of turned because he knew he'd be drinking a _lot_ of that with her. 

 

"Why'd he do something as nice as that?" 

 

"Because guys like to think they can trade alcohol for other things that I'm never going to give them ever in their entire lives?" 

 

Usopp grinned. "You are the most _cunning_ individual I know." 

 

"He's the one who said I could have the whole bottle, it's his fault." 

 

"Oh, I agree entirely." 

 

Nami raised her eyebrows and looked down at the bottle in question. "Should I give it back?" 

 

Usopp snorted. "Hell no." 

 

They twisted open the bottle, and they took preliminary shots, and they both made the exact same semi-horrified expression over the taste, gasping for breath once they'd swallowed it down. They shared the rest of Usopp's beer in a hurry, trying to rid their mouths of the burning aftertaste of cheap unflavored vodka. 

 

"Let's find soda." 

 

"Good idea." 

 

They slipped away from the basement, away from Bryan or Ryan and the rest of those guys, and they navigated through groups of people towards the fridge upstairs, and they found the soda they'd hoped was there. 

 

"I feel like it's okay to take this soda because Law tries to act like he's not our friend when in reality, he's at our house, like, once a week," Nami said as she pulled a couple cans of Coke from the fridge door. 

 

"I feel like that's an excellent point," Usopp agreed. 

 

They each took another shot, this time properly chasing it by chugging their sodas. 

 

"He's totally our friend, I don't make the rules," Nami said, wiping her mouth. 

 

They drifted around, and they wound up in some chairs in the corner of one of the larger rooms on the main floor, right next to a giant indoor potted tree or bush or something, passing the bottle back and forth and watching everyone. Like they usually did at some point during parties. 

 

"Hey, Nami," Usopp said after a few minutes, and she looked over at him. "Tell me what's going on with you already." 

 

Nami pulled her knees up to her chest, chewing on her bottom lip. "I don't want to." 

 

Usopp rolled his eyes. "Don't be such a child." 

 

Nami let her head fall back, resting it against the back of her chair. 

 

Usopp didn't push her any further for the moment. It was surprising enough that she actually admitted something was going on in the first place, so easily. Maybe she'd drank more than he thought. Or maybe she was just as tired as she looked lately. 

 

"If I tell you..." she began, looking up at the ceiling, and Usopp had to strain to hear her against the noise of the party, "... I don't know. You can't tell anyone." 

 

"I mean, that's fine—"

 

"I'm serious." 

 

Usopp straightened his back a little. "Uh. Okay?" 

 

She looked over at him and narrowed her eyes, like she was warning him of something. And then she held out her hand for the bottle of vodka, and Usopp gave it to her. 

 

"Not tonight," she said, her voice level as she unscrewed the cap and leaned over to grab the can of Coke she'd set on the floor. 

 

"Nami—"

 

"Just not right now. I'll... I'll tell you tomorrow. At the start of the new year. I'll tell you." And then she took a fat swig of the gross vodka, and Usopp grimaced a little. 

 

"Alright." 

 

She handed the bottle back to him. "Just drink this with me and... let's just have fun tonight. Let's just get real fucked up tonight, you and me, and we'll worry about everything tomorrow." 

 

Usopp nodded and looked down at their bottle that was already almost half gone. "You got it." 

 

Well. That was some sort of huge victory, probably. Not as painful as he'd thought it'd be. But then again, it'd taken him, like, over a whole month to get her to admit anything was wrong at all. So he didn't know how much of a win it really was. 

 

But then, after he took a shot big enough to match hers, because he wouldn't be outdone by her so early in the night, he saw her looking at him. She was smiling a little. 

 

"Let's have the best New Year's Eve either of us has ever had," she said, and Usopp accepted her invitation. 

 

They didn't separate from each other at all that night. They followed each other, grabbing at wrists and linking arms, leaning and tripping over each other. Usopp breathed in the rush of alcohol and sudden drunken decisions and Nami. 

 

Nami was... Nami was a lot of things, to Usopp. She was his best friend, yeah, but she was more than that. Or something. It was hard to describe or explain. 

 

In a way, she was... she was excitement. She was impulse. She was laughter that brought tears to his eyes and left them rolling down his cheeks. She was all these things he'd never really had in his life, that he'd never experienced, up until he met her. She was a state of total independence, and she was adamant, and to him, in his mind, she was adventure. 

 

He'd never met anyone like her. 

 

She was maybe the strongest person Usopp had ever met. She was totally fearless. 

 

She was beautiful, and she was mean in the best ways possible, and nice in the worst ways imaginable. And Usopp was really glad she'd walked into his life one sweltering afternoon in late August. 

 

Looking back over the past year, Usopp compared the person he'd been in January to the person he was at that moment. And he knew, he was different from who he'd once been. And all of it—the way he cussed more, and the way he drank a _lot_ more, and the way he slept so much less and saw so, _so_ much more of life—all of it was Nami. 

 

They finished their first bottle of vodka, and Nami led the hunt for more. Usopp held onto the hem of her shirt, letting her drag him along, and then she stopped suddenly and spun around. He nearly ran into her. 

 

“It’s almost midnight!” she said, looking at her phone and then holding it up in his face, like three centimeters away from his nose, like he could read something that close. He pulled his head back a little and squinted at the time on the screen. They had, like, a whole half hour still. 

 

“It’s, like, _slowly approaching_ midnight.” 

 

“Whatever, we just have to make sure we’re together when midnight happens.”

 

Usopp blinked, and he knew how bloodshot his eyes must’ve been, because it burned to keep them closed for long. “Why?” 

 

“What do you mean, _why?_ ” 

 

“Is there some kind of… midnight thing…” 

 

Nami stared at him like he was an idiot. And that was fine, he was pretty used to that expression by now. 

 

“If we’re together at midnight, then we’ll be together for the rest of the year, dummy.” 

 

“ _Ohh_ , I wasn’t aware of that. Okay.” He leaned slightly and grabbed her hand, threading their fingers together. “Do not lose me, I am getting very drunk.” 

 

She squeezed his hand and grinned. “I won’t.” 

 

She didn’t let go of his hand until they found a group of people standing around the bottom of the stairs, crowded around Luffy and Trafrownyface Law, who were both giving each other the most obstinate looks Usopp had ever seen on either of their faces. 

 

They found Zoro and Chopper standing in the group, and they walked up to them. 

 

“What’s going on here?” Nami asked, standing on the tips of her toes, trying to see over everyone. 

 

“Drinking contest,” Zoro said, explaining it in his usual vivid detail. 

 

“Okay?” Nami looked like she was about to hit Zoro. 

 

“The two of them,” Chopper cut in, pointing at the stairs, “are about to race to the top.” 

 

Nami and Usopp looked past all the other people jammed together at the bottom of the stairwell. On every other step, there were two shot glasses filled with some kind of dark liquor. And at the top of the stairs, there were two identical glass mugs filled with deep amber beer. There were thirteen stairs, so six shots for each of them and a beer to finish. 

 

“They’re both going to throw up on each other,” Usopp said, making a face at the blatantly straight-forward challenge at hand. 

 

“Ideally,” Zoro said, smiling a little as he watched both of them. 

 

“How the _hell_ did Luffy get Law to agree to this?” Nami asked, folding her arms. 

 

“They have some kind of bet going on,” Chopper informed her. “If Luffy wins, he gets a grotesque amount of meat from Law’s work.” 

 

“What if Law wins?” Usopp wondered, eyes drifting back to Law and Luffy. 

 

Chopper shrugged and smiled a bit. “He won’t say.” 

 

Nami laughed and Usopp shook his head, and one of Law’s friends—Shachi—stood on the stairs and shouted at everyone to shut up. 

 

Surprisingly, the room obeyed. 

 

“I think the rules are pretty obvious,” Shachi started out, grinning. “First man to finish all the booze laid out before him wins.” 

 

Everyone cheered, and Nami cupped her hands around her mouth and shouted Luffy’s name. Usopp joined in her cheering, and Chopper did too, and Shachi had to shut everyone up again so he could actually start the race. 

 

“Alright! We go on ‘go,’ gentlemen. Not on one. This is America, we go on go.”

 

Law and Luffy both looked at him like he was stupid as hell, and Shachi made a bit of a face—what little face could be seen from under his ugly hat—and raised his arm. 

 

“Okay! Three!” 

 

Both Luffy and Law looked back at the stairs. 

 

“Two!”  

 

Usopp could see the clear resolve on both of their faces. 

 

“One!” 

 

Obviously, both of them were _deeply_ motivated to win. 

 

“Go!” 

 

Usopp screamed Luffy’s name along with the rest of his roommates that were standing there. Even Zoro yelled for him. 

 

They were… _almost_ evenly matched. But Law was, shit, downing his shots like they were water, and Luffy was coughing a bit, but they both made it to the top of the stairs at nearly the same time. Luffy had both his hands around his glass mug, and Law gripped his with one tattooed hand, the other clenched in a fist, both of their eyes squeezed shut as they craned their necks back together and chugged their thick beers. 

 

Law won by maybe two or three gulps. 

 

All the people around Usopp were shouting, cheering, jumping up and down, and Usopp was yelling too, just to be making noise along with everyone else. 

 

Both Luffy and Law made faces like they were concentrating really hard on not throwing up, and Usopp wanted to barf just having witnessed how much they drank in the span of maybe a minute, and then Luffy suddenly turned towards Law. 

 

“You cheated!” 

 

Usopp could hear him well enough, now that the crowd was dispersing to other areas of the house, with the show being over. 

 

Luffy made a move like he was about to shove Law down the stairs, but Law caught his wrists in place, and for the first time in Usopp’s life, he saw Law smile. 

 

 Luffy wrinkled his nose and squinted at Law. “We’re doing that again, and this time, you’ll—“

 

Usopp could also hear Law, and maybe it was also the first time he’d ever heard Law raise his voice above his weird creepster smooth-jazz-radio-DJ volume level of speaking. 

 

“Like _hell,_ you pathetic loser.” 

 

Luffy glared up at him. “We’re going to re-do it! You just won because you’re way taller! So you have an advantage!”

 

“How—“

 

“Also! I’m going to throw up, where’s the bathroom!” 

 

“We’re upstairs. You know where the bathrooms are.” 

 

“Oh yeah!” 

 

And with that, Luffy spun on his heel and trotted off down the hallway, and Usopp laughed at the whole thing until Nami started pulling him away. 

 

They were off on their own again, but there was purpose behind their movements, and it didn’t take Nami very long before she found two beers for them to work on. Shitty beers. In a can. But free, so whatever.

 

“Usopp, it’s almost time, shit,” Nami said, looking at her phone. “We need to find everyone!” 

 

Nami and Usopp ran back upstairs, taking them two at a time, and they found most of the people at that party crammed into the biggest room on the main level. They could spot everyone—Chopper and Zoro with full shot glasses in their hands, and Sanji was across the room, laughing with someone Usopp didn’t recognize, and Luffy was back in action, seemingly totally recovered. 

 

“ _Ten!_ ” 

 

Nami whipped around and turned to Usopp.

 

“It’s starting!” 

 

She yelled this at Usopp as everyone else in the room shouted, “ _Nine!_ ” 

 

The year was suddenly ending.

 

“ _Eight!_ ”

 

“This was maybe the best year of my life, starting in August,” Usopp blurted suddenly, like he was being rushed. 

 

“ _Seven!_ ” 

 

Nami bent over hurriedly and set her beer on the ground, and she popped back up just as quickly, and she put both her hands on Usopp’s cheeks and grinned. He smiled back at her, because that was all he could ever do when she made that face, and she leaned forward and kissed him. He dropped his can of beer on the ground, and he heard the aluminum clatter against the hardwood. 

 

“ _Four!”_

 

Shit, Usopp lost a few seconds there. 

 

“ _Three!_ ”

 

He'd never really felt so.. god, so incredibly _happy_. Never in his life. 

 

“Happy New Year, Usopp!” Nami yelled at him as she pulled away, her hands sliding down his neck before she withdrew them entirely, she was smiling so hard, and he reached forward and wrapped his arms around her, folding them over her shoulders, hugging her tight to his chest. 

 

“ _Two!_ ” 

 

“Happy New Year, Nami!” he shouted back in her ear, just as everyone started jumping up and down and toasting their drinks together and hugging and kissing each other. He could feel her arms squeezing tight around his back, and he couldn’t wipe the grin off his face if he wanted to.

 

“ _One!”_

 

 

* * *

 

Half an hour until midnight and it already felt like Zoro had been there for decades.

 

Zoro hadn’t wanted to go to the goddamn New Year’s Eve party. What he’d _wanted_ to do was something more along the lines of drinking beer alone in his room, because that was really all he felt like doing for the past week or so. Lots and lots of beer. And sometimes whiskey. And work. And that was it, that was all he wanted to focus on. 

 

“I actually have a class with Nami and Sanji this coming semester!” Chopper was telling him in his excited I-was-drunk-within-twenty-minutes-of-getting-here voice. 

 

“Cool.” 

 

Zoro didn’t really care. He was trying to be nice, but god, he didn’t care. And he didn’t want to think about the classes he signed up for next semester. Which started really fucking soon. _Fuck._  

 

Well, at least fencing would be starting up again, too. The _one_ thing still going well for him. Jeez.

 

“Yeah, Sanji and Nami both had a history elective they needed to take, so they asked me if I wanted to sign up with them! I can’t imagine being in a class with them. The class is weird, too, I think?” 

 

“Is it?” Zoro was trying to act like he was engaged, really. He sipped his beer and stood with Chopper, surrounded by lots and lots of people at Law’s frat.He should probably start drinking more. Judging Usopp and Nami’s composure, Zoro had a feeling they were going to be doing a fraternity sleepover that night. 

 

“Yeah, it sounds pretty interesting, actually! Non-Western Civilizations, I think? I don’t know, Sanji _insisted_ we sign up for that one.” 

 

“Oh yeah? Why was that?” 

 

Why the fuck did Zoro even ask, was a better question. 

 

Chopper giggled a bit to himself—he was the only giggler at the Sunny, really, but it was grossly fitting—and he said to Zoro, “Oh, Sanji said the professor is _smoking hot_.” 

 

Right. Why the fuck did Zoro even ask. 

 

Chopper _did_ do a pretty spot-on impression of Sanji’s accent, though, and Zoro cracked a smile despite himself. 

 

“I’m going to go find us a couple shots to do at midnight,” Zoro said, starting to turn away from Chopper. 

 

“Wait, no, I really don’t—“

 

“It’s New Year’s Eve, you’re obligated,” Zoro cut him off. 

 

Chopper made a face at him. 

 

“Get over it and go find Luffy. He’s in this room somewhere.” Zoro looked around for Luffy because he knew he’d _just_ seen him not long ago, returning from successfully barfing the results of his race against Law. 

 

“Fine.” Heh. Poor Chopper. He hardly fought it anymore. 

 

Zoro slipped away to go find liquor because at this point in the night, and at this point in his life, also, he really couldn’t drink _too much_ booze. And also because he wanted to get away from Chopper for a minute. Just… just for a minute. Just to breathe. He didn’t really give a fuck about New Year’s midnight traditions. He wasn’t even sure if taking a shot at midnight even _was_ a tradition, but it sounded legit in his head. 

 

Stupid fucking Sanji. 

 

God, what the _fuck_ , he hadn’t even been thinking about anything having to _do_ with Sanji, and yet his goddamn brain just defaulted back to him. It was a fucking nightmare. 

 

He couldn’t stop thinking about Sanji. It was frustrating. Well. It was goddamn infuriating, but Zoro was trying to keep his cool about it. 

 

He probably shouldn’t have gotten so emotional at Sanji. While he certainly didn’t regret a word he’d said to that dumb prick that night, Zoro sort of wished he wouldn’t have seemed so upset. That was like… showing he cared more than he really did. 

 

He definitely didn’t _care_ very much. Not about Sanji or about what’d happened. It was dumb. But he didn’t care.

 

Zoro scanned various countertops for unattended bottles of liquor to borrow. He should’ve brought his own bottle or two, but fuck, he hadn’t _planned_ on going to this stupid party. But Nami, dammit, had done that _thing_ she did, and she’d called him out like she was goddamn good at doing, and…

 

God damn it. He really did care. He fucking cared. 

 

He didn’t care about Sanji, no, not fucking anymore, at least—but he cared that Sanji had played him so hard. He cared that Sanji didn’t care. Fuck, he cared that he literally hadn’t even _seen_ Sanji since that dumb Christmas party, up until Zoro had walked into the Sunny a little over twenty-four hours ago and saw him sitting on the couch between Nami and Usopp. And he’d only glanced at him. Just for a second. It was almost weird, actually seeing him there. Looking like he’d been run over by a bus. 

 

That night in the bathroom of the frat castle Christmas party, Zoro had said some shitty things to Sanji, because they were fucking true. And then Sanji had just upped and disappeared for days. And Zoro knew he could only be so many places other than work. And that was fucked up. 

 

Sex wasn’t as meaningless to Zoro as it was to Sanji, and that, really, was the foundation for the whole fucking shitty situation. 

 

Zoro found a few shot glasses sitting by themselves and grabbed two of them. 

 

If Zoro was going to be absolutely honest with himself, then maybe, yeah, in another world, things could’ve been different. If Sanji wasn’t such a shitty fucking person that acted like a super decent human being one minute and treated him like trash the next, and if he didn’t try to fuck half the planet for shits and giggles… then maybe Zoro wouldn’t have reacted exactly how he did in that stupid goddamn bathroom. 

 

And that was admitting a lot, even to himself. 

 

But. God _damn_ it, Sanji could be such an okay person. So what the fuck, was _all_ that a lie? Was _all_ of his bullshit ultimately backed with selfish intentions? 

 

Zoro wouldn’t fucking doubt it. Sanji was a fucking bitter asshole when he wanted to be. And it was hard to fake that shit. 

 

Whatever. 

 

Zoro finally found a bottle of rum and just grabbed the whole thing, and he kept wandering around, looking for Chopper. 

 

Sanji had done a great job of making himself scarce for the nearly the entire duration of the party thus far, which was totally fine by Zoro. 

 

A little weird, though. Weird that Sanji wasn’t just retaliating with malice like Zoro would expect from someone as shitty as him. 

 

Maybe he was avoiding Zoro outright. 

 

Either way, it didn’t matter. 

 

Zoro weaved his way through people for a couple minutes until he found Chopper. It always took a minute to find that kid. He was kind of short. 

 

“Chopper!” Zoro shouted, getting his attention, and he shoved one of the shot glasses into his hand. 

 

“Damn it, Zoro,” Chopper groaned, but he held his glass out either way, and Zoro filled it to the brim with the rum he’d found. 

 

“Just take it, nerd, Happy New Year,” Zoro huffed, filling his own shot glass. 

 

He glanced around the room as everyone started doing the whole countdown-to-the-New-Year thing. 

 

Usopp and Nami looked happy. And Luffy was grabbing Law by the front of his shirt. Chopper was eyeing his shot with some level of dread. 

 

And then Zoro saw Sanji. 

 

He hadn’t been looking for him, really, but when he saw him on the other side of the room—Sanji was looking straight at him, and Zoro’s stomach kind of dropped. 

 

Sanji didn’t look angry or anything. He had some kind of expression on his face, but hell if Zoro could read it. 

 

Fucking people around him screaming how many seconds left in the year. 

 

“ _Six!_ ”

 

God, it was the first time Sanji had even so much as looked at Zoro since that night, he realized. He was standing with a group of people Zoro didn’t recognize at all.

 

One of them nudged Sanji’s shoulder, and his face went back to neutral, back to controlled, back to fake, and he looked across the room at Zoro for just a second longer before turning away from him. 

 

“ _Five!_ ”

 

Sanji slapped that dumbass smile back on his face and grabbed whoever he was standing next to by the arm, grinning at him. 

 

“ _Four!_ ”

 

He was standing next to some guy, some guy who was noticeably taller with red hair, and Zoro looked back down at his shot glass. 

 

“ _Three!_ ”

 

Fucking… idiot. 

 

“ _Two!”_

 

Zoro craned his neck back and downed his shot in one hard swallow. 

 

“ _One!”_

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> agh and thus ends part one of mnm~*~*~ and im p sure we broke 100k words or so, so lemme just say wow thank you for reading this far, it means the world to us, and your support is like the best thing that exists!!!! thank you so so so so much forever !!!!!!!!!


	8. January

Nami ignored the awful taste in her mouth She was asleep. She was definitely still asleep. 

 

She was completely under a blanket—one of those awful thin blankets that was more like a sheet than an actual blanket, and maybe it was soft once, but now it was just old, and faded, and a little fuzzy and scratchy. One of those blankets that seemingly every household in the world had shoved into the back of some storage closet. 

 

They all seemed to come in either a faded light blue, or some kind of gross salmon color. There was no other alternative. The one she was under currently was of the salmon variety.

 

She shifted, burying her face into a warm chest. 

 

Ah, familiar. She knew who this was. 

 

He smelled like him, like he always did. Like coffee and a garage in the summer and that one smell, that _boy_ smell that all boys had. 

 

She could feel Usopp’s arms fold around her shoulders, hugging her face to his bare chest as he moved a little, trying to get onto his side, but she braced against him, keeping him from moving, because she sure as hell wasn’t giving up what little space she had on the couch to accommodate him. Besides, she needed him to stay exactly where he was. He was her pillow, and he needed to stay on his back for her to remain totally comfortable, which was extremely important. 

 

He gave up and Nami moved her tongue around her mouth, trying to stimulate some saliva or something, doing what she could to rid herself of the worst early-morning-slightly-hungover-and-I-don’t-know-where-I-am-yet mouth she’d had in a while. 

 

She pulled the scratchy blanket down and poked her face out into the world—oh yeah, she was at Law’s frat—and she breathed in fresh, cool air, and, oh god, what the hell, it was _freezing cold_ in that house. 

 

Usopp yanked the blanket back up. “Get back in there. It’s—“ he shivered, “—f-fucking freezing.” 

 

Nami didn’t argue. Instead, she cozied back down and made a small breathing hole in the blanket, folding it around her so that just her nose and mouth were poking out the side. 

 

Her hair felt like one giant knot. She could literally _feel_ the tangles in it. 

 

She could hear a television. She could hardly make out what the people on it were saying, the volume was so low. She burrowed deeper, wedged between Usopp and a large couch cushion. She didn’t remember falling back asleep. 

 

She woke back up to the sound of a familiar string of poorly-hushed curses. 

 

“Fucking _shit!_ Stupid fucking idiots—“ 

 

Nami poked her head out from under the blanket.

 

“Hey, Sanji!” she whispered loudly. 

 

He looked over at her, just having caught himself from tripping and smashing his face into the floor, a blanket that looked just about as lush as her own pulled over his head and clutched tight around his chest and shoulders. He was hunched over, picking his way over unconscious bodies that littered the floor, an unlit cigarette in his mouth, seemingly headed for the back door to smoke outside. 

 

He smiled, his cigarette bobbing as he spoke. 

 

“Oh, hey.” 

 

Taking a large step over an equally large body, Sanji made his way over to them, and Nami sat up and nudged and pushed and _shoved_ Usopp until he was curled into a covered ball at the end of the couch, making enough room for Sanji to work his way in there. 

 

Sanji and Nami sat shoulder-to-shoulder, their legs pulled up to their chests, and he wrapped half his blanket around her, always generous, always sharing whatever he had, giving it away to her if he could, and they each held a side of the crappy blanket around themselves and shivered as he lit his cigarette. 

 

They looked around the room together, taking in the damage and coming to terms with the fact that they were actually awake while Usopp shook and vibrated in the cold beside them. 

 

“What time is it?” Nami asked, and Sanji shifted and wiggled a little, struggling slightly to get his phone out of his pocket. 

 

He squinted at it. “Before nine.” 

 

Nami groaned and rubbed her eyes. “I need water so bad.” 

 

“I’ll get you some. Or,” Sanji nodded off towards a hallway, “there’s a bathroom. And a kitchen.” 

 

She pursed her lips together and shoved herself off the couch, stealing the blanket from him, and he let her have it, opting to steal Usopp’s in its stead. 

 

She could’ve sworn she could see her breath as she made her way down the hallway with no shoes and only one sock and a scratchy blanket wrapped around herself. It was somehow colder in the bathroom. Of course. She looked at the shower, and she contemplated locking the door and turning it on with the heat cranked up to full blast and just laying down in it for a while. She dipped her head under the sink and sucked cold water into mouth until she felt dizzy instead. 

 

Ugh. 

 

She grimaced at her reflection in the mirror, at her smeared eyeliner and her tangled hair, which she threw into a bun for the time being. 

 

She realized she was wearing Usopp’s long-sleeved shirt under the scratchy blanket and couldn’t help but smile down at it. It was warm. Warmer than what she’d been wearing. That’d been the reason she was wearing it in the first place—she remembered arguing with him at some point late in the night over how freezing cold the house became after people started leaving and the general body heat started lessening. 

 

“I need it _more_ than you, Usopp, I’m much smaller than you,” Nami had said to him, pulling at the hem of it, drunk and thoughtless. 

 

“Hell no! Get off me—you are _not_ that much sm—“ Usopp stopped himself when Nami narrowed her eyes at him. “—you may be _a lot_ smaller than me, but you still can’t just _have my shirt, Nami—“_

 

She’d wound up essentially yanking it off his body. And he’d put up a pretty good fight. 

 

Nami sighed, alone and shivering in that freezing cold bathroom as she hugged Usopp’s shirt and the crappy blanket around herself, staring at her own reflection. 

 

God damn it.

 

She’d promised him that she’d tell him today—all the shit she’d been hiding. And he’d remember, too, that she’d said that—he wasn’t going to let it go. 

 

That was fucking stupid of her, to have agreed to tell Usopp about all the things she’d been keeping from him, and from everyone, over the past month. She hadn’t meant to say that she’d tell him. But, god, she had been a little drunk, and she was _tired_ and stressed and maybe a little scared out of her mind. A part of her wanted to tell him. No. More than that.

 

She’d wanted to tell him, really fucking bad, the entire time. 

 

Dipping her head under the faucet one more time, she drank as much tap water as she could handle before leaving the bathroom. 

 

Ugh. 

 

When she made her way back to the couch, wondering where her shoes were, she saw Usopp gathering all his might and pushing himself into a sitting position, and he managed to get himself up off the couch once she was fully returned. He wordlessly made his way down the hall, no shirt, arms wrapped around himself, shaking. 

 

Nami re-situated next to Sanji, huddling up next to him, and she studied the ends of the sleeves of Usopp’s shirt while she marinated in the shellshocked feeling of waking up the morning after being fucked up. 

 

“Hey, look what I found,” Sanji said, nudging her, and he nodded to the end table next to the couch. It was littered with mostly-empty beer cans and bottles—one of which he’d taken and was currently using as an ash tray. She followed his eyes and spotted a joint—unless someone had hand-rolled a cigarette, which wasn’t likely—sitting on the table, totally intact and forgotten. 

 

“Oh thank _god_ ,” Nami said quietly, leaning against Sanji as she reached over him and grabbed it and held her hand out for a lighter. 

 

“I know _,_ right _,_ ” he mumbled in return, handing over his lighter, and she glanced at him for a second before sparking the godsend-weed. 

 

Not the worst start she’d ever had to a new year, probably. 

 

When Usopp came back, still shivering, she held the smoking joint out to him, and he took it and fell onto the couch, and he and Sanji situated the two blankets in their possession to cover all three of them as best as they could, with Nami sandwiched between them. 

 

Usopp held out a plastic bottle of water he’d apparently found somewhere. She snatched it from him, gasping. 

 

“Oh my god, where did you _find this,_ ” she breathed, unscrewing the cap. 

 

“Er—the fridge?” 

 

Nami rolled her eyes and Usopp passed the joint to Sanji, and the three of them huddled together on some nice couch in some giant room in Trafootball Law’s frat house, watching whatever was playing on the television across the room, smoking and sharing their water and trying to keep warm in comfortable silence. 

 

The TV show was weird. It was animated, some old MTV cartoon maybe, and it was fucking weird, and Nami could barely even hear what the people on the show were saying, but she didn’t care. 

 

She hooked her arms around the elbows of each boy on either side of her and kept them close. 

 

 

* * *

 

 

One by one, as Usopp sat there shivering with Nami and Sanji on Law’s couch, the rest of their roommates slowly appeared over time, yawning with crackly voices and groggy movements. Over the course of about an hour, every single one of them approached wordlessly and sat on or around the couch and joined them in hungover silence, watching some weird old MTV cartoon on the television across the room. 

 

Even Luffy, who was the last to finally appear from whatever hallway or bedroom he’d holed himself up in for the night (Usopp could probably guess which room), was pretty damn quiet. Even _he_ looked like a wreck. There were dark circles under his eyes and his hair was everywhere—more so than usual—and even the look on his face was almost out of character for him. Kind of funny. 

 

“Sanji,” Luffy croaked from his spot on the floor in front of them, and he didn’t even turn around as he sat with his knees pulled to his chest and asked, “will you make breakfast later?” 

 

“Yeah, duh,” Sanji replied, and then, after a brief moment of obvious reflection and a flick of his cigarette into a beer can, he looked around at all the tenants of the Thousand Sunny, paused, and said, “Wait. Why are we all sitting here freezing our asses off? We’re all awake now, let’s fucking go home.” 

 

Every single one of the Thousand Sunny tenants that sat there gathered on and around Law’s couch, huddling together in the throes of recovery, surrounded by several sleeping bodies they couldn’t identify, stared off into space in complete silence for several consecutive seconds, concurrently realizing that they were all sitting there on the brink of hypothermia for _no fucking reason_. 

 

And then, their movements totally synchronized, they all began dragging themselves into mostly-standing positions and checking their pockets to make sure they had all their possessions before returning to their home where they actually utilized their central heating like decent people. 

 

Usopp finally got Nami to return his goddamn shirt. 

 

He’d lost his jacket at some point during the night, and he’d just considered it to be gone forever, stolen and eaten by the house—and that was fine, like, he _cared_ about losing his jacket, but he also knew that caring about it wasn’t going to make it suddenly appear.

 

So Nami taking his shirt from him on top of that had only added to how ridiculous the whole situation really was. 

 

She’d put up a really good fight. Honestly, she’d earned the shirt. 

 

If Usopp had to bet on who’d win in a fight between him and Nami, in literally any given situation, he’d bet Nami every time, hands down. 

 

Before they left Law’s frat, Sanji looked at Chopper and stopped walking. 

 

“You know what, we should grab a plastic bag because he’s clearly not going to make it,” Sanji said, and Chopper shot him a look. 

 

“I can _totally_ make it,” Chopper insisted, although he didn’t look too sure of himself. 

 

Sanji snorted. “Don’t lie to yourself.” 

 

Chopper frowned, and then he looked at the floor for a beat, and he really did look kind of grey and generally terrible as he said, “Okay, I may barf, you’re right.” 

 

“I’ll go find you a plastic bag,” Sanji replied. 

 

“Do you just inherently know when plastic bags are available,” Usopp mumbled as he kept walking to the door, because he’d started moving, and if he stopped, it was going to be really difficult to get going again. 

 

“I’m pretty sure every American household has a plastic bag filled with a million other plastic bags,” Sanji said as he wandered towards the kitchen. 

 

Well. Good point. 

 

As they walked to the car, Nami and Chopper held onto either one of Usopp's arms, and the three of them clutched at each other with chattering teeth as they fought against cold January wind. Zoro and Luffy trailed behind them, hands shoved deep in their pockets as they powered forward with their heads down. And Sanji brought up the rear, nondescript white plastic bag in hand. 

 

Usopp opened the hatch of his car and let Chopper crawl inside, since the back seat was already folded down. Chopper curled into a little fetal-style ball and closed his eyes and groaned, and Sanji leaned into the trunk and gently laid the plastic bag across Chopper’s face. 

 

“Shh, sleep now, and when we get home, I’ll make you something good and it’ll make you feel better,” Sanji whispered at him, half-mocking and half-sincere, the way he somehow always managed to be. 

 

“I’m not eating anything,” Chopper mumbled from under the plastic bag, and the car rocked back and forth as everyone else slowly piled in. 

 

“You _are_ , and you’re going to _like_ it, and it’s going to make you feel _much better_ ,” Sanji replied, leaning over further into the trunk as he spoke, whispering _louder_ until he was doing that shout-whisper thing people did when they were trying to be angry and quiet at the same time. 

 

Chopper groaned at him and Usopp put a hand on his shoulder, pulling him from the trunk, and he shut the hatch once Sanji was out of the way and went to go start up his car. 

 

He could barely even touch the steering wheel, it was so cold. He pulled his sleeves down over his palms and shifted the car into first. 

 

Nami was curled up in the front seat—Usopp wasn’t sure if she’d _ever_ sat in the back at this point—and Luffy was half-sprawled across Zoro and Sanji in the middle row, and neither of them seemed particularly super pleased about it. 

 

The car ride home was particularly quiet. It was too early in the morning to be talking very much anyway. Chopper puked in his plastic bag as they were pulling up in front of the Sunny, and Usopp was grateful for Sanji’s foresight. 

 

As Usopp and Nami walked side by side towards the front door, trailing behind everyone else, a thought occurred to Usopp. 

 

“You’re telling me the thing today, aren’t you?” he asked quietly, glancing over at her. 

 

She was silent for several seconds, and it wasn’t until they reached the stairs leading up the front porch that she said, “Yep.” 

 

Everyone took turns showering and lazing around and groaning to themselves while Sanji made breakfast. Luffy turned on a documentary and laid down in the middle of the floor on his stomach, right on the hardwood in front of the television, and he closed his eyes and either listened to some guy who looked like he had a collection of blow-up dolls in his basement talk about underwater UFOs, or he just passed out entirely, Usopp couldn’t even tell. 

 

The documentary had a good point, though. If there was ever a great hiding place for UFOs on Earth, it was at the bottom of the ocean. 

 

Usopp half-watched the show and half-watched Nami and rubbed his temples.

 

He couldn’t really imagine what was so intense about Nami’s problem that she’d actively tried to hide it from him for the past month. There was always the possibility that he’d been reading too far into things, but that whole idea was pretty much squashed as of last night. 

 

Last night had actually been one of the best nights of his life. And he was feeling it so hard at the moment. Eugh. 

 

Nami really was his favorite person to have a good time with. 

 

At one point, probably past 2 in the morning, she’d plugged her phone into Law’s speaker system and turned on something appropriately trashy and obnoxious, intent on dancing _really hard_ , and Law had been standing right there and turned around and wrinkled his nose upon hearing her song selection. 

 

“Really?” 

 

“ _Fuck_ you, Law, I will _fight you_ ,” Nami had threatened, whipping around and standing on the tips of her toes at him. 

 

He’d snorted and rolled his eyes in a very Law fashion, and he’d leaned over and turned up the volume and shooed her away to go dance. 

 

Luffy was actually just as enthusiastic as Nami about the genre choice, and he danced maybe harder than Usopp had ever seen him dance. And he’d seen Luffy do a lot of dancing over the time that he’d known him.  

 

Usopp smiled to himself while he sat in a sloppy pile on the big love seat in the giant downstairs common area of the Thousand Sunny, remembering all the little moments like that—all the little things from last night that’d made him laugh, that’d survived the purge of memories he’d suffered due to sheer alcohol intake. 

 

He looked over at Nami out of the corner of his eye. Her hair was wrapped in a towel, freshly showered, and the rest of her was wrapped in a giant fuzzy robe, and she was rapid-scrolling through her phone, her eyebrows pursed together—that was the thing she did when she was thinking about something really intensely. She wasn’t even really looking at the screen on her phone, probably. Usopp had seen this face many times, more so in the past month. 

 

His stomach felt weird. 

 

After breakfast—after Sanji barked at Chopper to eat, and after Chopper had admitted to Sanji’s grinning face that, oh, okay, he _did_ actually feel a lot better, and after everyone drifted towards their respective bedrooms to try to sleep off the rest of their hangovers—Nami turned to Usopp. 

 

“Okay. Alright, c’mon.” 

 

His stomach felt _weirder._  

 

He followed her into her room, and she closed the door behind him. He sat on her bed, because that was more or less his usual spot by now, and she stood across the room, her back still flush to her bedroom door. 

 

She looked at him and pursed her lips together. 

 

There was a weird lull. 

 

“So…” Usopp began slowly, and she already looked uncomfortable. Which was weird, because it was _Nami._ Stranger still because it was _him._  

 

“So,” Nami replied, taking a deep breath and a few steps away from the door. 

 

Usopp waited patiently. 

 

She paced a little and then sighed. “I guess it’s best to start from the beginning.” 

 

“Alright?” 

 

She turned to him. “You remember I went to go see my sister in November.” 

 

“Yeah.” 

 

“That’s when all this started—that’s when I found out about everything.” 

 

“Everything?” 

 

Nami nodded. “Yeah.” She cleared her throat before she continued, “Nojiko and I… well, you know our mom died when we were younger.” 

 

Usopp made one of those “mhm” sounds and waited. 

 

“Well she died almost _right_ after Nojiko turned eighteen.So I mean, we got everything that was my mom's, and we got to stay together, but we didn't have any other family or anything—so Nojiko became my legal guardian and she took over running the farm.” She leaned against the edge of her desk, looking down at the neon-colored socks on her feet. “We'd always been _really_ fucking poor. We never had a lot, but after that, we struggled just to keep the roof over our heads, and to eat once a day. Really, it was awful.” 

 

She took another deep breath before continuing. 

 

“But we managed. Nojiko stopped going to school so she could work a million hours a week. I’m so far in debt with loans just to _be_ here at Sabaody, but if I can keep my shit together… anyway—I’m getting off track. Point is, we’ve always just barely scraped by.” 

 

“Got it.” 

 

So this was a money thing. Wasn’t that always the root of evil. 

 

“So I find out in November that, years ago, my sister had taken out some kind of loan that had this big balloon payment due.Like, you know, where you pay nothing but interest for awhile but after a couple of years, this huge amount needs to get paid?”

 

Usopp nodded—to let her know to go on more than anything, because he didn't have any idea what the hell she was talking about.He barely knew how his student loans worked.

 

“It was such a terrible deal.If she'd understood it better, she probably wouldn't have taken out a loan like that.But she was _maybe_ 19 at the time, so she didn't really _get_ the fine print, even if she read it. So that bigass payment was due in October—and if she didn't pay it, she'd lose the whole farm.She was trying to do all this and keep it from me. I don’t know why she thought… Ugh.” 

 

Nami scrunched her nose, clearly paused on thinking about it for a few seconds before continuing her explanation.

 

“Nojiko talked to a lot of lenders, but none of them…” Nami trailed off, looking like she might crumble.Usopp could only guess the total sum of what they owed. Land was expensive and valuable as all hell, especially out where they lived. Even a small orchard—“We’re so fucked, Usopp.” 

 

Nami looked up at him, and Usopp frowned at the face she was trying very hard not to make. 

 

“We’re _so fucked,_ ” she repeated, whispering it. 

 

“Keep going.” 

 

She rubbed her face. “Yeah. Okay.” 

 

He put his hands on his knees, feeling a little queasy just at the direction things were going already, and at the expressions she kept making as she spoke. 

 

“So, long story short, Nojiko's involved with a loan shark.” 

 

Usopp clenched his jaw a little. Shit. 

 

“And he’s—Usopp, I’ve tried to think of _everything_ to get out of this, and… and I just—“ 

 

“Nami,” Usopp cut her off, and she looked up at him, starting to mess with her hair out of a nervous anxious habit. He could recognize these sorts of things pretty easily when people started doing them. And Nami wasn’t prone to it. He smiled at her a little. “It’s okay. It’s just me.” 

 

She nodded again and sighed. “This loan shark has threatened her safety—and mine, by connection. He’s got a big group of people in his fucked up operation, so it’s not like I can just … do something directly about the son of a bitch. My immediate reaction when I found all this out was to tell Nojiko that we needed to go to the police, like get into some kind of witness protection program at least or something, just get _away_ from this guy, but—“ 

 

She sat down on the chair at her desk, bouncing her leg a little. 

 

“—turns out you can’t just stroll into the police station and say, hey, I feel like I’m in danger, I need to be relocated. They’ll give you a restraining order, but what the fuck is that going to do?” 

 

Nami looked down at her hands as she lowered her voice and continued speaking a little quieter than before. 

 

“Anyway… this guy runs a chop shop.” 

 

Usopp pursed his eyebrows together, shifting in his spot on her bed. When she didn’t say anything else after that, he ventured, “And…? What, you’re moonlighting at a chop shop dismantling stolen cars?” 

 

Her knee bounced faster. “Usopp, I swear to god, I tried everything I could think of to make money. A _lot_ of money. A lot of money very quickly. There aren’t many options at all for people like us. Especially with no real connections. And… I mean, I even thought of being a stripper.” 

 

“I’d still be your friend if you were a stripper. Strippers are seemingly nice people. I’ve met some really nice strippers,” Usopp said. 

 

Nami snorted. “I know you would. Even still, it wasn’t enough. I looked into it all. It doesn’t pay as well as you’d think, unless… well, I’m not that comfortable with—“ 

 

“It’s okay, Nami,” Usopp cut her off, and she looked up at him, chewing on her lip. 

 

“Anyway, it wasn’t enough.” 

 

Usopp waited in the heavy silence, as uncomfortable as he’d ever been around her—he wasn’t really sure what he was supposed to be doing currently. He just wanted to support her, however he was supposed to do that—he didn’t know if he should hug her or… man, she really looked like she could use a hug. He thought about just standing up and walking over and doing that, because it seemed appropriate, but she distracted him from all that. 

 

“You can get over six hundred bucks just for one old shitty car at a chop shop,” Nami said, almost whispered it. 

 

Usopp paused, processing this. 

 

He met her eyes. 

 

“What?” 

 

“Even stripping, I couldn’t make that much every night. Not easily. And I can’t sell drugs, it’s too fucked up, and I can’t just…” 

 

“Back up—you’ve been—are you trying to tell me that you’ve been gone all the fucking time because you’ve been goddamn—“ 

 

“Yeah.” 

 

“You’ve been stealing cars.” 

 

“Yes.” 

 

“Shut the fuck up,” Usopp breathed, their eyes locked, and his stomach churned because this was _so goddamn fucked up_. “You’re not serious.” 

 

She didn’t say anything. 

 

“That’s so fucked up—do you realize—“ 

 

“I know it’s fucked up! I know! I know it’s really, really awful, but fuck, Usopp, it’s my _sister_ , and if it was just the farm, that’s one thing, it’s just fucking property, it’s a _place_ , a _thing_ , but Nojiko is—“ 

 

“You can’t just—“ 

 

“I know! I know. Don’t say it, because I already know, alright. But I’m trying to do as minimal damage as I can.” 

 

Usopp was still trying to process the whole thing and accept it as reality, like he was experiencing actual cognitive dissonance over this.“Huh?”

 

“Comprehensive insurance. I only take cars with that.” 

 

“What?” 

 

“Comprehensive insurance—it’s full coverage. The car’s fully insured.” 

 

“I know what comprehensive insurance is, Nami, but—“ 

 

“A lot of companies have it labeled right on the card. And most people keep the cards in their cars. In the glove box or something. So. So I thought—I thought that was… I think this is the realistically the best and maybe only way to make as much money as I can—enough to get my sister out of danger—while causing the least amount of damage.” 

 

Usopp swallowed and didn’t say anything for a moment. His hands were shaking and his heart was actually racing, he was having such a hard time dealing with this information. 

 

“Just go to the police. Tell them about the chop shop and get this guy arrested.” 

 

Nami nodded. “I thought of this. That was one of my immediate thoughts. But the guy has such a big group that getting _him_ is actually kind of impossible. He’s never there. I can’t prove his connection to the place. And if I can’t take down the whole group…” 

 

“Oh yeah. Uh… move to Mexico?” 

 

Usopp didn’t actually want Nami to move to Mexico. He couldn’t really stand the thought of not being able to see her anymore. 

 

“We still owe him all that money, that’s the problem—I’m … I’m scared to run. I’m scared to do anything, almost, I’m so scared to lose my sister, Usopp—I don’t care about myself, but Nojiko—“ 

 

“I get it,” he said, kneading his hands together. “Um. God, there must be something…” 

 

“If getting a lot of money were easy, a lot less people would be poor. And a lot less poor people would look to crime to solve their money problems.” 

 

She had a good point. A lot of people committed crimes because they were out of options, not because they _wanted_ to, really. 

 

Usopp sighed. “You could be a stripper.” 

 

Nami snorted. “Right?” 

 

“I’ll be a stripper, too. If we both strip every night and pool our money, then we can _totally_ —“ 

 

“You’d make the worst stripper ever, Usopp.” 

 

“ _Wow_ , how _dare you._ ” 

 

Nami smiled a little, and she took another long, shaky breath. 

 

The silence that came with the slow acceptance of the reality of the situation was heavy and suffocating. 

 

“Fuck, Nami,” Usopp said after a minute, his eyes rising to meet hers again. “I don’t know what the hell to do.” 

 

“You don’t have to _do_ anything,” she replied. “This is my problem, not yours.” 

 

“I’m obviously going to do whatever I can,” he said, trying to overpower her straight stonewall expression. 

 

“Stop.” 

 

“What, I’m not—“ 

 

“Usopp! I don’t want you trying to be involved! You _swore_ you wouldn’t tell anyone, and I’m a big girl, Usopp, I can figure this out by myself—“

 

“But you don’t _have_ to do it alone, Nami,” Usopp said, standing up, and she was almost glaring up at him. “This is too much for one person. You do realize how serious—“ 

 

“Of course I do!” She clenched her fists in her lap. “Of course I do. Nojiko’s already doing everything she can. She’s not helpless, we can take care of ourselves. And, shit… If I can’t beat him, at least I can work for him and pay everything off.” 

 

Usopp looked down at her, at his best friend, who was, wow, going through more than he really could’ve anticipated, and he felt like he couldn’t take a breath that was deep enough. He sat down on the floor. His legs were starting to get all adrenaline-shaky again. 

  

“What am I supposed to do,” he began, his voice low, “just sit here every night while you go out and fucking steal—“ 

 

“Yes!” she cut in, leaning forward in her seat, pulling his eyes from the carpet with the harshness of her speech, “You’re going to sit here every night and pretend you don’t know a goddamn thing because… I can’t let you. I won’t let you risk all that.” 

 

“I can’t,” he said flat out, and he didn’t know what to do, exactly, but he knew what he _couldn’t_ do, and that was let Nami continue like this. This was unreal. 

 

“Well. You have to.” 

 

He didn’t look away from her.

 

And then, he got that one feeling—one he hadn’t experienced many times, but he knew it when he felt it—and he held his breath while he lingered in that feeling, where his heart was pounding and everything felt frozen, where he realized he was experiencing a moment in time where he was going to make a decision that would ultimately change the course of his life.

 

All the air escaped Usopp’s lungs as he said without breaking her intense eye contact, “I’ll go with you.”

 

She almost laughed. “What, no.” 

 

He nodded slowly, and he didn’t know what the fuck he was thinking or saying, but the words came out of his mouth regardless. 

 

“I’ll go with you. And I’ll help you.” 

 

She immediately shook her head. “No.” 

 

“No, it’s—I’m probably better at it than you are. What do you know about cars, anyway?” 

 

She faltered. 

 

Usopp continued, “You don’t know hardly anything. I… I can—I’ll help you. And we’ll do it fast and we’ll… we’ll just get it over with. And we’ll pay off the guy, and you and your sister will be fine, nobody will get hurt, and you’ll keep the farm and it’ll be fine.” 

 

He was speaking, but he wasn’t thinking about it at all. His heart was beating in his ears. And somehow, his voice wasn’t cracking. 

 

Nami didn’t say anything for a minute. 

 

And then, finally, she said, so quietly, “Fine.” 

 

Usopp pursed his lips together, not really willing to directly think about what he’d just offered Nami, or what he’d just gotten himself into. What she was already very involved in.

 

“It’ll be okay,” Usopp said, his voice just above a whisper, and she nodded heavily. 

 

“Yeah. Alright. Okay.” 

 

 

* * *

 

 

A blast of winter air hit Franky in the face as soon as he opened the restaurant doors.He adjusted the thick plaid scarf around his neck as he stretched his arm out, holding the door open.

 

“Look at that!Maybe we should've driven after all,” Franky boomed, craning his neck to look up at the falling snow.

 

“It's barely even coming down,” Robin replied as she stepped past him, glancing over her shoulder to meet his eyes.“A walk in the snow is nice, every now and then.”

 

“If you say so,” he grinned, following her and letting the door fall closed behind him.It was only a few blocks back to his apartment, but it felt like it was getting colder by the minute.

 

Winter was probably one of Franky's least favorite seasons, to be honest—mostly the _clothes_ , all those layers of sweaters and long pants and coats and hats.They were stifling.Ideally, someday he'd move somewhere where he could wear beach clothes every day—maybe Hawaii.It seemed like as good a plan as any, although it might not be the best place to further develop some of his inventions, with all the sand he'd probably be tracking into his workshop, since he imagined it being right along a beach, and who wears shoes at the beach?

 

Franky glanced over at Robin, who sort of looked like a movie star to him—or somebody equally attractive and sort of awe-inspiring, he wasn't really good with analogies of famous people—wearing a long wool coat and hat that seemed kind of _classic_ , although he didn't know a whole lot about women's fashion.Or men's fashion, for that matter, he thought, frowning at his old brown jacket.But even if she was more suited to winter, she'd probably look stunning in summer clothes, too—any season.In fact, he couldn't really imagine her looking _bad,_ and he had a pretty active imagination. 

 

He wondered if Robin would ever like to live on a beach. 

 

Geez, what a silly thing to think about right now—it wasn't like he was going anywhere anytime soon, and even if he was, it wasn't like she'd have any reason to come with him.  

 

Still, he couldn't help but daydream, just a bit, about convincing her a hot climate was the way to go, even as they casually strolled down the street, making small talk—not that it ever felt like small talk with Robin, because every little detail felt deep and meaningful and significant.

 

Robin slowed her pace slightly, snapping Franky out of that particularly risky train of thought.She'd stopped to pull her vibrating phone out of her purse.

 

“I should take this," she said, looking up at him, smiling a little apologetically. "Sorry—just a moment." 

 

Pfft. No need to apologize.

 

The way she answered told him it was definitely work-related—she'd recently been asked to participate in putting together material for some kind of video series, which he actually thought sounded super interesting just from what she'd told him about it.Plus, it seemed like she really enjoyed it. It was a way to reach out to even more students than her own.  

 

He found himself smiling every time she talked about it, because even beneath her seemingly cool exterior, he could _feel_ her excitement.

 

Shoving his hands in his pockets, he leisurely listened to her end of the conversation. To the sound of her voice. 

 

Robin always sounded so calm and confident, it sort of made him feel the opposite.His heart pounded a little more than it should have been.

 

Loud, rapid footsteps began to approach, too quickly—they almost kind of sounded like flip flops, but that'd be crazy, wearing sandals in this weather.  

 

As the person was about to pass them on the narrow sidewalk, Franky reflexively put his arm around Robin's shoulder and pulled her close to him, turning so his body blocked her just as the rushing man burst past them.His overstuffed backpack whacked Franky on the side of his arm, but he had braced himself for it.

 

“Sorry about that!” the young man shouted back as he spun around, still not stopping, actually running _backwards_. 

 

Okay, yeah. He really _was_ wearing flip flops.

 

That shaggy black hair and that scar under his eye actually looked a little familiar.Huh. Maybe he was a student or something.Franky gave him a quick wave and smiled, letting him know there was no problem.

 

“Ten tomorrow would be great.You'll email me the call in number?… Great, I look forward to it.Talk to you then.”

 

Franky smiled at her composure—the person on the other end of that call probably had no idea anything out of the ordinary has just happened.  

 

“I didn't even hear him coming,” Robin said, putting her phone away.“Are you alright?”

 

“Oh yeah, he barely even hit me.” 

 

It'd take a lot more to have any real impact on him.What did hit him pretty hard, though, was one of those weird flickers of uncertainty he got around Robin just _constantly_. Moments of hesitation and second-guessing himself that he wasn't used to.At all.

 

He nearly pulled his arm away from her on impulse, but then Robin leaned into him a little more, and it made his heart do a little skip.  

 

Maybe this was okay, then.

 

An aggressive gust of wind rushed past them, and Robin reached up and pulled the collar of her coat a little closer to her neck—even though he'd just thought she looked totally in her element in the thick of winter, now she looked just plain cold.And that just wouldn't do.

 

Franky quickly started unraveling his thick wool scarf from his neck.“Here, take this.The cold doesn't really bother me too much.”

 

“Is that so?” Robin asked, reaching toward the scarf he was offering her—but instead, she snatched his bare hand, pressing it between her palms and fingers.“You feel cold to me.”

 

“Well, sure, it's cold, but I'm fine—”

 

“I have an idea,” she interrupted, and she took the scarf from his hands. 

 

She stood on the balls of her feet, right in front of him, and she wrapped one arm around his neck, and he just stood there without moving. Didn’t realize his hands were clenched in fists. And then, holding the other end of his long scarf, she did one quick, graceful twirl—like an actual _spin_ —to wrap the scarf around her own neck. 

 

She smiled at him. 

 

It took him by surprise, and Franky faltered. He should’ve laughed or made a joke or _something_ , because that’s what he’d usually do, at least, but instead, he was being strangled and choked up by this feeling he couldn’t deal with logically. 

 

They were sharing his giant ugly scarf. 

 

He couldn’t really move. He understood that he was supposed to keep walking, but he was stuck. Stuck over her, and the color of her cheeks against the cold night air, and he was staring down at her—but not really that far down, because she was so tall, and, god, he loved that she was tall, because if he wanted to, he could just lean down a little bit, not far at all, and her lips would be _right there_ , so close, just bend his hips incrementally—

 

He caught himself when he was just a couple inches away—almost _didn’t_ catch himself—and he realized his hand was on her shoulder, and he was maybe about to do something Robin didn’t want him to do possibly. 

 

An apology started to form in his mouth, but it died in the back of his throat as Robin stood up a little bit straighter and the couple of inches of space between them disappeared.His lips had nowhere to go but against hers.

 

His mind blanked and heart did something that reminded him of a sputtering engine. And it all ended _way_ too soon. 

 

Franky was literally speechless—he had no words—for a couple of long seconds while he stared at her, his eyes probably kind of wide, and she had that elusive smile of hers planted on her face—the same smile that’d completely sucked him in from the very first time he ever saw it. 

 

“The temperature's falling fast, isn't it?”Robin commented, her gaze drifting upward toward the darkening sky.

 

“Yeah,” Franky agreed reflexively—except it wasn’t cold out at all. It was actually kind of really warm out, somehow.

 

When they arrived at his apartment and Robin unraveled the scarf from between the two of them, for maybe the first time in his life, Franky felt a pang of regret over shedding his winter clothes.

 

“So, should we watch that movie you were talking about?” Franky asked, messily throwing his coat on a hanger and jamming it into the closet.“That one from, uh—Argentina, right?”

 

“You're right, but I didn't mean to imply we have to watch it,” Robin said, shrugging off her wool coat. 

 

“No reason we shouldn't though, right?” Franky replied, reaching out to take her coat.

 

“Well, it's subtitled...”  

 

“I'm actually better at reading than you'd expect,” Franky grinned as he hung up her coat, much more tidily than he had his own.  

 

Robin cracked a smile, obviously holding back a little.

 

“Come on, we'll watch it.”There was no way they couldn't, when she looked that happy at the prospect.

 

“Alright.” 

 

She didn’t sound enthused, but Franky knew better. He could see it in her smile, and in her eyes. And it was funny, the way she tried to play it off like she didn’t want to make all the decisions, because Franky was more than happy to let her take the wheel whenever she wanted it. Honestly, he’d rather she would. All the time. 

 

“Would you like some wine?” 

 

Franky smiled. “Sounds great.”

 

“Do you want to pick which bottle we open?”Robin asked, already opening one of the kitchen cabinets, reaching for two wine glasses.  

 

“Nah, you decide.”  

 

Franky watched her navigate the kitchen with ease, and it gave him a sort of fluttery feeling inside.It wasn't that surprising she knew where to look—she'd been over several times before already—but there was something about it that made him feel kind of... happy.  

 

Even better, she'd brought over three different bottles of wine. Since they obviously weren't going to drink all of those in one night, she'd brought them in anticipation of coming over _again_ —and that was a _really_ super thing to think about.

 

“Could you get me your corkscrew?” 

 

“Oh yeah!” Franky exclaimed, immediately dashing in the direction of his bedroom.“I've got something _super_ cool to show you.” 

 

“Hmm, a corkscrew related surprise?” 

 

 

Franky's corkscrew was _terrible._ It had these dumb little levers that made no sense—that didn't apply force properly so it required a heck of a lot of arm strength just to pop the cork out.Just a few slight modifications could've given it the torque it needed.Probably would've been cheaper for them to manufacture that way, too.As it was, it was almost totally useless.

 

Luckily, for a super talented inventor like Franky, modifying it was child's play.And he hadn't stopped at getting it to do the job it should've done in the first place; he'd disassembled the piece-of-shit corkscrew, taken the parts he needed and combined it with some random parts he had in the various storage drawers of his house, and in just a couple short hours, he'd reconstructed his very own electronic wine bottle opener with a way better design and functionality.

 

When Franky returned to the kitchen, Robin was standing in front of his refrigerator, staring at the row of wine bottles on the top shelf, a look of concentration on her face. 

 

And he realized that he’d stopped walking and started staring, but she looked so… at home in his home. 

 

Franky didn’t often have guests over. He wasn’t used to people just _knowing_ where things were in his apartment. He wasn’t used to people being so comfortable with him. 

 

And he thought to himself that, while she was standing there in his kitchen, already looking in his fridge for a bottle of wine because he didn’t have to tell her where anything was anymore, that in that moment, she looked perfect. 

 

Franky absently set the modified corkscrew on his kitchen countertop as he took a few steps towards her. 

 

And he reminded himself not to screw up for maybe the nine-hundredth time. 

 

“Let’s have the Moscato,” Robin decided as Franky stepped beside her and abruptly pushed the refrigerator door closed before she had a chance to grab the bottle. 

 

She raised her eyebrows, and Franky knew he should’ve explained himself, but speaking—he didn’t want to speak right now. 

 

Before she could say anything in her perfect cool voice, or stare him down with her perfect dark eyes, he slipped his fingers along the line of her jaw, and he buried them in her hair, and he leaned down and kissed her, pressed his lips hard against hers because earlier—earlier, that was too short, and it wasn’t enough, and he needed her to know what he thought about her, crossing lines be damned. 

 

She ran her hands up his chest, along his neck and into his hair, and he could feel her _pull_ just a bit. He inhaled super quickly through his nose, and his eyelids fluttered a little because his whole body erupted in this tingly feeling, and her touch was the first drop of a roller coaster, it made his stomach drop and his heart punch the inside of his chest, and he slid his hands down her ribs and her waist and her hips, around to the small of her back and up to the dip between her shoulder blades, and he hugged her tight against himself. 

 

She could probably feel his heartbeat. 

 

But even if she did. So what. She should know. 

 

And _damn_ , her mouth—the way she kissed him, so much energy and all confidence, because that was her—never submissive, always completely and totally his equal, maybe more than that. 

 

He could feel her lips part—god, her lips were so soft and so perfect—and when he rolled his tongue against hers and felt her sigh against him, breathe harder against his mouth, and press against him more, Franky held her by the waist, tightened his grip, and he effortlessly lifted her upwards and set her on the countertop, not letting their lips break apart. 

 

Something toppled into the metal sink basin with a crash, but he ignored it. A truck could crash through his wall right then, and he would’ve ignored it. 

 

Robin didn’t, though. When he felt her pull away, he wanted to grab her and hold her there, but he caught himself at the last minute. His hands fell to her hips as he leaned back just slightly, his eyes fixed on her as she glanced at the sink beside her. 

 

“We broke a glass,” she mentioned, unperturbed, and her eyes met Franky’s again. Her face was slightly flushed, and he reached up, letting fingertips slip through loose tendrils of hair falling across her shoulder. 

 

As the silky strands slipped from his grasp, he found himself desperately wanting to know what it felt like—what her hair felt like against his skin. He couldn’t do that with his hands, because of goddamn nerve damage that happened so long ago, but he needed to feel it, and by total impulse, he leaned forward, reaching for her hair again and bringing it to his lips. And it was perfect, and soft, like he knew it would be, and it smelled like those little while flowers that might’ve been jasmine, but he didn’t really know much about flowers. 

 

He opened his eyes, and she was looking right at him, her hair still pressed to his lips. And he remembered that he’d never told her about how he didn’t have feeling in his hands, and he froze, caught in her eyes, and he opened his mouth to speak, to try to explain. 

 

“Uh. Sorry. I, uh…“ 

 

But she didn’t look confused or put off. No, she didn’t look anything like that. 

 

She looked perfect, and he kissed her again. 

 

He held her cheek, her hair still between his fingers, and he was wrapped up in her, pressed his other hand against the nape of her neck, and his lips grazed the side of her cheek and her jaw before they found they way to the side of her throat and Robin inhaled sharply. 

 

His heart beat a little faster. He wondered if he could get her to do that again. 

 

Like it even needed to be a conscious thought, though. Of course he was going to try. 

 

Robin’s elbows were resting on his shoulders, and she pulled at the collar of his shirt a little, slipping her fingers underneath it, fingernails gently scratching at the skin of his neck, and Franky actually shuddered—but it was that good kind of shudder. 

 

Franky moved his lips down to her collarbone, and he felt it as much as he heard it—that quick little inhale, not quite letting out her voice, but god, it was sexy, and he barely knew what to do with himself. 

 

Robin’s fingers wrapped around his jaw, guiding his mouth back to hers, and Franky’s heart skipped and stumbled as she yanked him back into a kiss, and her tongue was out of this damn world. He hummed against her lips as she brushed that spot on the roof of his mouth right behind the front of his teeth, and the entire roof of his mouth went numb. 

 

That familiar heat building in the back of his abdomen was burning and white-hot—but this was new and different from what it’d been like for him, he was pretty sure. Robin just. She just did something to him. 

 

She finally let out a kind of throaty, quiet murmur, all mixed up with pleasure and breathlessness, and just—shit, the impact of it made him feel like he’d been hit with a hammer, like, oh _god_ , he could’ve fallen to his knees right then and there—but Robin hooked her legs around him, so instead he just pressed himself closer, and he kissed her like unlike anyone he’d ever kissed before, like he’d never get enough.

 

Franky lost track of time, standing there, his body pressed up against hers, trapping her along the kitchen counter while she held him there with her legs. 

 

It made his chest hurt for a different reason when they finally stopped, and their lips parted and they put a space between them that may as well have been several hundred miles, if it meant he wasn’t touching her anymore.  

 

Franky stared at her, noticing how her lips were a little redder than usual, and how her hair was just slightly tossled—which was a first, she usually looked like she never had a single strand out of place—and he almost just started kissing her again.

 

Robin smiled, nodding in the direction of somewhere behind him.“Is that your corkscrew-related surprise?”

 

Oh yeah.

 

Franky snatched it from the countertop and started giving her the full presentation.Like always, she seemed into it—dammit, she was amazing—and after their more-than-welcome little delay, they finally got the bottle of wine opened and sat down on Franky's couch together to watch the movie.  

 

For the first time, Robin curled into his side, and he put his arm around her, and he knew he was in trouble.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Usopp bounced back and forth between feeling sick to his stomach and like he might pass out. Also numb, there was a lot of numbness going on. 

 

He was driving his shitty old station wagon south down the interstate with Nami in the passenger seat. 

 

They were actually literally honest to god holy shit about to do this. 

 

Jesus Christ. 

 

He wished it wasn’t such a long goddamn drive to the city. 

 

That was the plan—well, that was what Nami had been doing for the past while, at least. She took the train to the city an hour South, where the chop shop was also located, and did everything there. 

 

He still couldn’t really wrap his mind around the fact that Nami had actually been going through with this for, like, a month now.Longer than that, even, probably. 

 

So basically, they intended to go to big parking garages and other locations where there were a lot of cars all together in one place, and they would leave Usopp’s car elsewhere, steal whatever they could from the parking garage, or wherever, and drive that back to Usopp’s station wagon, and he would then follow Nami to the chop shop in his car. Solid operation. 

 

So fucked up. 

 

It’d actually been Usopp’s suggestion that they go somewhere like a parking garage. He’d felt surprisingly guilty for even saying it, but it made more sense to go there, and they were going to do the thing one way or another, so what did it even fucking matter. The sooner they paid everything off, the sooner they could stop. 

 

Once they got to the city, finding a parking garage with lots of cars that’d been parked there overnight actually didn’t take long at all. But then again, they did have the home field advantage—Usopp had grown up in this city, after all. It wasn’t like he’d completely forgotten where everything was. 

 

Usopp parallel-parked his station wagon on a dark street with rows of 4-unit apartment flats all crammed together, and they got out and locked the doors and pulled the hoods up on their jackets because it was cold and also because parking garages sometimes had security cameras and wow, they were going to steal someone’s car. Okay. 

 

The parking garage was only a few blocks away, and they both walked in silence with their hands jammed in their pockets. 

 

He glanced over at her. She was wearing his hoodie and was kind of drowning in it, even though he wasn’t all that much bigger than her, and she had a pump wedge hiding in the front pocket, and tucked against her body, she carried a very thin and flat metal bar with a hook shape on the end. 

 

Usopp had grabbed a screwdriver from his backseat because, uh, he didn’t really know what else he’d need, and he was kind of panicking once he’d parked his car and Nami started getting out, so he’d just reached back there and grabbed it because he knew it was on the floor and he wanted to seem more prepared than he felt, at least. 

 

Once they got to the parking garage, they walked with their heads down, taking the winding stairs up to the third or fourth level, and Usopp had stopped walking almost immediately and looked over. 

 

“Hey, check it out.” 

 

Nami had explained to him that there was a sort of loose criteria when it came to selecting a car to take. Older, but not too old. Common makes and models. Obviously nothing with an alarm, but something that looked decent enough to insure. 

 

And they were both looking at a Jeep that still had one of those temporary license plates taped to the back window.Older model, but not that old.It'd obviously just been bought from a dealership—and cars that weren’t fully paid off _had_ to have comprehensive insurance. So. 

 

“This is fine,” she said, stepping up to the passenger door. “Okay, remember, we don’t take it unless it has full coverage insurance,” she reminded him, needlessly, as she started trying to work the pump wedge in between the window and the frame. 

 

A pump wedge was basically a pouch that a person could pump full of air via this little hand-squeezey pumping apparatus—essentially, they were like the things nurses used at the doctor’s office to squeeze a person’s arm and check their blood pressure. With the pump wedge, a person would wedge the pouch between the window and the frame of a car door and pump the pouch full of air, which would push the window down far enough to stick Nami’s hooked bar thing down in there and grab or push the lock switch from the inside and disengage it.

 

God, this was going to take _forever._

 

“Here, no, look—“ he said as he stepped up beside her, and he was suddenly _really glad_ he brought a screwdriver. Ahh, his reliable flathead. It’d always done him well. 

 

He jammed it into the lock on the outside of the car door and used two hands to start prying it off. With a little bit of muscle and applied force, after a few seconds, the lock popped out of its sealed spot within the door entirely, and it hung there, completely broken. 

 

Usopp opened the door for her and she was looking at him like… well, okay, he certainly wasn’t upset over the expression on her face. He tried not to lapse into proud bragging of his natural genius. 

 

“I had no idea you could just do that,” she said, sliding into the car, and he walked around to the passenger’s side, his head still down and his face hidden by his hood, just in case, and she unlocked the side door and let him in. 

 

“You can’t do it on everything, obviously, but these older Cherokees…” he began as he sat in the passenger’s seat and closed the door behind him. “Here, look—“ he continued, and he leaned across the center console and jammed his screwdriver into the starter and, once again, simply pried it from its plastic housing in the steering column. 

 

“Hey!” she said, looking over at him, and he held up his screwdriver. 

 

“You don’t even need a key or anything to start it. Now you can start it with, like, anything. Like a butter knife. Or a screwdriver.” 

 

“Cool, great—but we didn’t check the _insurance_ thing, and I _even reminded you, dickbrain—“_

 

“Oh yeah. Oh. I’m sorry,” Usopp frowned, and he realized he’d gotten a little ahead of himself. Shit. 

 

Damn it. He was an asshole. He could’ve broken someone’s starter for no reason. Ugh. 

 

All of his previous confidence and high self-approval ratings tanked pretty hard, and he opened up the dash because he might as well check for a card, even though it was actually pretty unlikely an older Jeep would be fully covered, even if it was purchased recently, because these things had a fairly shitty trade-in value—

 

But, oh! 

 

Usopp raised his eyebrows and grinned down at the insurance card in his hand that he’d found in the glovebox. Comprehensive insurance through Allstate. 

 

Hell fucking _yeah_. 

 

“We have a winner,” Usopp said to Nami as he looked over at her and tried once again to fight his smile. 

 

“No shit?” 

 

“Yeah, look—“ 

 

She snatched the insurance card from his hand and squinted down at it in the low light. 

 

“Holy shit.” She smiled at him. “Maybe you’re good luck.” 

 

“Most likely.” 

 

She was almost bouncing in her seat, saying, “God, I usually have to try, like, _several_ cars before I get one. This is actually _so_ unlikely, you don’t even realize. I mean, you’ll realize soon enough. Anyway, okay—so I can start it with the screwdriver? Just stick it in there and turn?” 

 

“Er. Yeah.” He handed his screwdriver to her and sat back, looking around the parking garage, suddenly remembering that oh, freaking Christ, this wasn’t their car and they were about to drive away in it. 

 

Usopp took some deep breaths and got that feeling like he was floating, because goddamn, this was surreal. It wasn’t the pleasant kind of floaty feeling that came with being stoned or sleep-deprived or something, either. It was pretty damn uncomfortable. 

 

Nami stuck the screwdriver into the steering column where the starter used to be and tried turning it. The car turned on, the radio flickered to life, but the engine didn’t turn over. 

 

“You have to, like, press in—you should feel this sort of … indented little bar thing, you just push it in and turn—“

 

“That’s exactly what I’m doing?” 

 

Nami demonstrated by turning the car off and on again, shaking her wrist to indicate that the screwdriver wasn’t going to turn anymore. 

 

Usopp took the screwdriver from her and tried it himself and frowned, mumbling, “What the hell, did I break it?” 

 

Nami groaned at him. “You broke the starter, you big idiot.” 

 

“No, this is, uh… this is more broken than what I could’ve done just now. This was already fucked up, I think.” 

 

“Why would someone buy a car with a broken starter?” 

 

“I don’t know, Nami—“ 

 

“Well. Goddamn it, Usopp.” 

 

He pulled the screwdriver from the steering column and chewed on his lip, frowning down at his lap. What the hell, did he actually break it? That was so unlikely, though. Damn it, why did he fuck everything up _all the time?_  

 

They sat there without saying anything, the radio still playing some crappy mainstream music that, actually, normally, Usopp would’ve liked. He and Nami actually knew all the words to this song. And always sang them whenever they heard it. 

 

“I mean, we can always just move on. We’re wasting time here,” he said after a minute, absently twirling his screwdriver between his fingers. He was getting paranoid. It was the middle of the night, but god, what if the owners of this car _came back_ , oh _god._

 

“But this one is—it’s got full coverage! And we’re already inside it and… God, we’re going to have to try so many more cars before we get another, ugh,” she groaned, leaning her seat back and frowning at the ceiling liner. 

 

Usopp nodded slowly, staring at the digital clock on the head unit. 

 

And then he actually gasped and probably scared the shit out of her, and he held up his screwdriver as he turned to her, immediately grinning as he said, “I’m fucking stupid. We can totally start this thing—I have this screwdriver!” 

 

She gave him the blankest look, obviously waiting for him to explain. 

 

He pointed at the radio. “The car’s turned on right now, which means we have power—it’s just that the ignition isn’t able to engage the starter, right, but we can do that ourselves manually by making a connection between two of the electrical terminals on the starter solenoid, which is super easy because we have this metal screwdriver!” 

 

“I don’t… okay, whatever, I believe you, so do it.” 

 

Usopp took a deep breath. 

 

“Okay.” 

 

… Yeah, okay, he was going to actually do this. 

 

When he opened up the door and lowered himself down to the concrete ground of the parking garage, he heard Nami’s door open, and under the Jeep, he could see her squat down on the other side. He went completely flat with his stomach against the ground, and he worked his way under the car, and she did the same and met him in the middle. 

 

“What are you doing?” he whispered at her. 

 

“It’d be stupid for me not to learn how to do this, right?” 

 

“I guess? Whatever. Your phone has a really bright light on it, right? Turn that on and shine it upwards,” he instructed, because he managed to work his way onto his back with his phone still in his back pocket before he thought about the fact that it was dark out and he couldn’t see jack shit underneath the Jeep. And getting into his back pocket from this position would be a pain in the ass. 

 

Ahh, pun. 

 

Usopp wanted to hit himself and confess to Nami that he was so fucking nervous that he was making shitty puns in his head, but he kept his mouth shut instead and squinted upwards when she shined her light on the underbelly of the Jeep. 

 

He couldn’t get his eyes or his mind to focus when his brain was firing off a million impulses per second that all screamed _run the hell away as fast as you can._ He took a shaky breath and tried to calm down. Tried to be like Nami, who was completely chill and laying on her back, and he tried to focus on feeling her shoulder pressed against his. 

 

She was so good at just… keeping it real… Jeeping it real. 

 

Usopp groaned and rubbed his face and concentrated. 

 

“I used to be a good student,” he muttered while he just grabbed her wrist and moved her hand around, because she was _not_ pointing the light where it needed to be. 

 

“You technically still _are_ a good student,” she pointed out.

 

“… Oh, duh, there it is. You know, it’s lucky that I was so well-prepared with this screwdriver.” 

 

Nami snorted. “You’re a mechanical engineering student. You have, like, three screwdrivers just sitting in your car, don’t act like you _pre-planned_ this.” 

 

“I think it was just this one screwdriver, unless there’s more I don’t know about?” 

 

“I think there’s at least one more in the trunk.” 

 

“Oh.” Usopp sniffed and looked back up at the underside of the Jeep’s engine. “I’m trying really hard not to throw up right now.” 

 

“You’re doing good so far.” 

 

“Thanks. I’m pretty sure we’re going to get shot and killed. I can feel it, Nami, this is, uh—“ 

 

“Usopp. Hold off on the panic attack for a few more minutes. We can do this.” 

 

Usopp swallowed hard and, yeah, he could do this. She was right. No problem. 

 

“Okay. Shine the light upwards again—right there, yeah—”  

 

He reached up towards the engine. The electrical terminals didn’t look like anything special—just two pieces of metal slightly sticking out from the rest of the component, and all he had to do was touch both of them at the same time with the metal part of his screwdriver. Which he did. 

 

Sparks flew like crazy and the engine kicked and roared to life inches from their faces.

 

Usopp could feel Nami flinch in surprise next to him, which was totally fair because it was _really loud_ and the sparks were pretty intense—but the Jeep was officially started and running. 

 

“Good job. Let’s go,” she said, rolling out from under the car, and Usopp was quick to follow. 

 

His heart felt like it was pounding out of his chest, but also like it was fluttering, like, uh… just skipping really aggressively all over his ribcage. 

 

He clenched and unclenched his fists over and over as he slid into the passenger seat and buckled his seatbelt and sat there, more nervous than he’d ever been in his life. 

 

Now that the car was running, he could feel it—the vibration from the engine was keeping him grounded in reality, and it was too much. 

 

“Okay. So. We just drive totally normal and it’s fine. We’ll go get your car, and you’ll follow me to the shop, we’ll drop it off, and then start all over again.” 

 

“Alright.” 

 

Usopp wrung his hands together while Nami idled the Jeep through the garage, going in slow circles down three stories to ground level and out to the street below. 

 

She drove normally and obeyed all traffic laws, and they arrived at his car a minute later. And he didn’t say anything while he got out and slid into his familiar station wagon, which, admittedly, he felt a lot better being in. 

 

The chop shop wasn’t far away. It was actually a pretty typical sketchy-looking 24-hour auto body repair shop. That apparently also specialized in disassembling stolen automobiles and selling off the parts. 

 

On the way there, she called him and told him to park a little ways down the street once he saw her pull into the shop’s parking lot. So he did. He wanted to drive by really really slowly and watch her go inside. Actually, he wanted to go in with her. Because she was alone, and she was just one woman in the end, and, ugh, he was going to throw up. 

 

He didn’t follow her in. And he felt guilty about it, but she knew what she was doing, and he trusted her that much. So he parked his car down the street, like she told him to, and he sat there in silence with the station wagon turned off and his arms crossed over his chest and his eyes closed, trying to breathe normally. And then, after about a minute, he opened his eyes and pulled on his car’s emergency break, just in case, and he got out and ran to the corner and threw up in a public trash can at the end of the sidewalk. 

 

He got back to his car about the same time Nami did. 

 

He spat onto the street one more time while he stood next to the driver’s side door, trying to get the bile taste out of his mouth, and then, together, they slid in Usopp’s car and shut their doors. 

 

Silence, for a few seconds. And then Usopp turned his car on, and they sat there. 

 

Then, moving at the same time, they looked at each other, and they each took a deep breath, and Usopp was the first to speak. 

 

“Holy fucking shit, we did it.” 

 

Nami grinned at him. “We sure as hell did.” 

 

Usopp couldn’t help it, there was no fighting it—even though he’d just thrown up and was still sweating, he broke into a smile, and he was shaking while he shifted his car into first gear and pulled away, visibly trembling, and he could feel it enough for the both of them—they laughed. They laughed really fucking hard, full of nerves and adrenaline and the sweet fucking feeling of victory. 

 

“This is so goddamn Grand Theft Auto right now,” Usopp said, still grinning, almost crying, and he didn’t know where he was going, but driving around his old city where he grew up having just gotten away with something so extreme was enough for him at the moment.

 

“This… literally _is_ grand theft auto, Usopp,” Nami said, and he didn’t take his eyes off the road, but he knew she was rolling hers. 

 

“I mean, like, Vice City—“ 

 

“I know what you meant, dork.” 

 

“Then shut up and let me continue freaking out!” 

 

“Okay, okay, sorry.” 

 

She smiled at him, though, several hundred dollar bills clutched tight in her hands, and he had never felt anything close to the way he felt that exact moment. 

 

His chest was full of air and felt hollow, and his legs were still shaking, but he could drive alright, and that was what mattered. His whole body was tingling, and… God, he was terrified, but at the same time, he felt like he could take on an army or win the olympics or swim across the ocean. 

 

“Fucking shit,” he whispered as he kept trying to take normal-sized breaths and not get dizzy again. 

 

Nami’s words echoed in his head. His own stupid bullshit words echoed in his head. _We can do this. It’ll be okay._

 

They drove around the city, and after they both calmed down enough to be able to walk again, they found another parking garage and began the process again. 

 

Nami was right when she said they’d have to try a lot of cars before they found another that fit their criteria. But shit, between the two of them, they got into plenty of cars, and they did it quickly enough while causing minimal damage. 

 

Nami used her tools that took a little bit too long, but they worked. Half the time, when she got a window down far enough for him to get his fingers into, he could shake and yank on the window hard enough to just dislodge the entire thing and pull it out of the doorframe. Way faster. Some other locks popped off. Others, he could stick the skinny bar she’d brought with her into the frame and yank upwards and catch the locking mechanism. Some people actually left their doors unlocked. 

 

They started the cars a number of ways.They found spare keys tucked away.And valet keys that Nami didn’t know about, hidden in the owner’s manual. They broke the starters on some—rather successfully, Usopp would add. That first Jeep had to be messed up to begin with. And the rest, they actually hot-wired. Between Usopp’s basic car knowledge and Nami’s research into the topic, they managed to get just about everything running.

 

They delivered every car they managed to find that had full coverage insurance to the chop shop, and there weren’t any hiccups or delays or anything. Actually, after they got into their rhythm, it was kind of… easy. 

 

By the time they were driving home about an hour before the sun was going to start coming up, Nami had a few thousand dollars rubber-banded together in a stack hidden her hoodie pocket. 

 

When they were almost back to the Sunny, Nami said, kind of quietly, “I’ve never made this much money in one night.” 

 

Usopp didn’t really know what to say, so he did the only thing he could ever manage to, and he kept moving forward. 

 

 

* * *

 

 

The beginning of a semester.Shit.  

 

Zoro's slight bit of success in December—which he actually didn't care to think about too much, because of the person associated with the _reason_ for that success—seemed far away as he had leafed through the new semester's worth of textbooks.Books which had cost a goddamn fortune, even though they were all used.And goddamn _old._

 

There was one thing to look forward to—and by one thing, he meant only one thing—and that was fencing. I t was the first official practice since December, although he'd gone to the gym himself many times over the break.Fencing was something that didn't require memorizing definitions and making practical applications and analyzing data.It was something he was good at.Really, the only thing he was good at.Plus, it cleared his mind of all of the school shit he was worried about—and work shit, too.  

 

Like how his work hadn't put him on schedule for the next two weeks.His boss had told him it was because they got slow after the first of the year, so everyone's hours were being cut.And his co-workers had told him it was the boss' passive aggressive way of firing people.

 

So. Fuck.  

 

But as he left the locker room, he left that shit behind him.It was time to focus.Closing his eyes, he drew in a deep breath, standing perfectly still as he visualized how he wanted his form to be.  

 

Visualize.Even in his deep state of concentration, the word made him grit his teeth a little.

 

When he opened his eyes again, the coach was standing in front of him, arms crossed.

 

“Uh.Hey.” Zoro was actually a little startled.  

 

Coach Mihawk was the sole reason their school had any kind of a noteworthy fencing team—which worked out for Zoro, since he probably couldn't have gotten into most colleges without fencing.His high school years were shitty, academically.Shitty overall, except for athletics.

 

Mihawk was also the only person on campus who had been a steady presence in Zoro's life for the past several years—which was probably why he could immediately recognize that something was wrong.Mihawk's eyes were normally clear and sharp, but today, they were a little clouded.Zoro unconsciously tightened his grip around his saber. 

 

“What are you doing here, Zoro?”   


The comment was unexpected and it stung, just a bit.The fuck was that supposed to mean?“Practice starts today, doesn't it?” he asked slowly, knitting his brows .Maybe he'd fucked up the dates—that had to be it.   


No, that wasn't right.Even if there wasn't practice, why would the coach be surprised to see him?He came to the gym almost every goddamn day.  

 

Mihawk pressed his lips into a thin line and the look on his face made Zoro's stomach churn. “The school sent you a letter a week or two ago.”

 

“A letter?”Why the hell would they send a letter?

 

“I take it you didn't get it.”  

 

Zoro tried to remember the last time he'd gotten paper mail from the college.Ah, shit—his old apartment.   


“ I moved last summer.I probably never gave the school my new address.”It felt dumb to say it aloud.But it was hard to remember all the shit to update after moving.“Is something going on with the fencing team?”

 

But he knew that was wrong, even as he said it.Other students were already showing up.  

 

Mihawk's gaze wandered to the other students as well.“Let's go somewhere else.”

 

Those words were heavy and Zoro felt like someone was sitting on his chest.Clenching his jaw, he followed Mihawk to a deserted hallway.The air felt nearly the same temperature as outside, like the heater hadn't been turned on in that part of the building, but Zoro could feel sweat beading around his hairline.His coach never spoke to him about anything but fencing practice—and Zoro had never seen him wear that expression before. 

 

In almost four years, Mihawk had never asked Zoro how life was, how classes were going—he didn't shoot the shit like that.He preferred to get right to the point of things, and it was something Zoro had been grateful for.A lot of professors tried to cross some weird line, like pretend-friendship was going to weirdly motivate him or something, but Mihawk had never tried to fill any other role than his coach.

 

There weren't many things this could be about—and all the possibilities were fucking terrible.

 

“I know you've been given some prior warnings,” Mihawk started, and even though Zoro couldn't meet his gaze, he could feel his stare.“About your GPA, and your scholarship.”

 

“Yeah,” Zoro could barely say.His heart felt like it was rattling inside of his ribs.  

 

“They revoked it.”

 

Motherfucker.  

 

But, Zoro sort of knew.Even though he'd done well on his exams, his final grades had been barely passing—not enough to raise his GPA, which was what he had been told he needed to do. 

 

It sucked, but it could have been worse.The scholarship was only a small dent in his tuition.It wasn't like it really affected him too much right now.Who knew how long it was already going to take him to pay off his student loans, so what was a little more. 

 

But Mihawk was still looking at him like he had something else to say and the weight on Zoro's chest felt like it was crushing him. 

 

“I've been aware of how you've been on the edge for awhile now, and how the university's given you a pass for the past several semesters.I haven't addressed it with you personally because I wanted you to be able to focus on what you needed to—you know better than anyone what you need to accomplish, and I'm not an academic adviser.”

 

Zoro nodded hesitantly.He knew he was lucky he got to keep his scholarship as long as he did—and it made him uneasy that M ihawk was still going on about it.

 

“And, as you should know,” Mihawk went on, averting his gaze to a point somewhere beyond Zoro, “the university has  a strict policy regarding its athletes. ”

 

Oh—fuck. Zoro's heart damn near sank into his stomach.He knew what the fucking policy was, but he also knew they made a _lot_ of exceptions based on performance.And if there was only one thing Zoro was confident about, it was his performance.

 

He felt dizzy.

 

“You're quite possibly the most outstanding fencer that Sabaody has ever had.You brought the team to finals every year you've been here.You've won multiple competitions.Because of your talent, the university made every exception they could,” Mihawk went on. “But now—”

 

Zoro leaned into the wall.He knew what was coming and he just wanted him to get it over with, to stop fucking sugar-coating it. 

“They've come to the conclusion that they won't make any more exceptions, Zoro.”

 

And there it was.His first reflex was to start defending himself—that he did better last semester.Better than he'd ever done.  

 

But he already knew, it was his GPA.That number that seemed to shrink down so easily, when it felt damn near impossible to raise it up again.And it was all that mattered at the end of the day—not how many hours he spent busting his ass to study, not all the stress and the torment he put himself through.That fucking number was going to decide the rest of his goddamn life.

 

And that number was _never_ going to be fucking high enough.

 

“I'm off the team.”Zoro filled in the words Mihawk wasn't saying. 

 

Mihawk's expression turned blank.“Yes.” 

 

“The tournament coming up—will they let me compete in it?”

 

It felt like the oxygen was being sucked out of the room.The pause was probably only a few fleeting seconds, but it felt endless.  

 

“They won't,” he said finally.

 

“Okay.”He managed to say it normally, but he didn't trust himself to say anything more.He turned around—he had to get out of there.  

 

Mihawk took a step toward him. “I tried to persuade them—” 

 

“Don't worry about it,” Zoro cut him off.There was nothing left that Mihawk could say that would make this better, and Zoro didn't want to even hear the attempt.Couldn't _stand_ to hear it.  

 

But Mihawk still kept fucking going.“Listen, I know you've got some time before you graduate.”

 

What a fucking understatement.He was so many credits short.  

 

“Concentrate on your classes for awhile.If you can study a bit more and pick up your grades, you know you'll always have a place—”   
  
Zoro sucked in a haggard breath and it drowned out the sound of anything else Mihawk might've been saying to him.Zoro knew he should just stay quiet, but the notion evaporated the moment it became a conscious thought on the surface of his mind.

 

When he opened his mouth to reply, it came out in a shout.

 

“What the fuck do you think I've been trying to do _all this time!_ ”  

 

He stood there a moment, staring at his coach, breathing heavily with his hands hanging in the air. 

 

He had so much more to say.Things he wanted to scream at the top of his lungs, because this was the onlything in his life—the _only_ fucking thing—that he did well.  

 

He hated business, hated school, hated how much he had to kill himself to accomplish so little.He'd made a promise, and this was the only way he could keep it—but he didn't know if he could fucking make it. With nothing to look forward to, nothing to balance that weight, that scale was going to topple over.

 

Zoro swallowed back the rest of his words and walked away, retreating to the locker room.Mihawk didn't follow him.Not a surprise.He grabbed all the shit from his locker—not like he'd ever be back, after all—and rushed outside, barely even noticing the blast of cold January air on his flushed face.

 

He clutched at his sports bag—come to think of it, he should've just thrown it in the trash, because where the fuck else was he going to _fence_ ever again—and just walked, stormed around campus, with no particular destination in mind.He couldn't think straight, didn't know what to do with himself.His next class wasn't for another hour and a half.  
  
Fuck it, he was going to go home.It's not like it mattered if he went or not anyway.  

 

He had fucking tried. He had fucking tried so hard for so long. 

 

A couple of nights later, there was a party at their house. Which, Zoro didn't really feel like being at, but parties meant booze and any excuse to distract himself was pretty goddamn welcome.It was hard to ignore everything shitty in his life when he had nothing else to focus on—nothing but his classes, anyway .Which he actually had gone to for the rest of the week—even though they may as well have been taught in a different language for all he got out of them.  

 

This same old fucking worthless cycle.He had to look for a job.Had to start studying again.Why the fuck did he keep getting stuck in the same loop?

 

Great things to be thinking about during a party, too.

 

He sat alone at one of the metal barstools along the kitchen countertop.He'd refilled his red solo cup so many times, he'd lost count, and he'd moved on from Jack and Cokes to just straight Jack Daniels, swallowing it in large, burning gulps.

 

He felt a little bit restless—sitting in the impossibly crowded space, hands and elbows constantly hitting his back.And people would fucking sit with him, every now and then—people he didn't even know—and try to make small talk or include him in their conversations.  

 

Maybe he did know some of them, actually.He'd probably met a lot of the people there before, but there were only a few that really stood out.Like Vivi—who currently had her arm linked with Nami, as Nami tried to weave through the crowd.Or that big, linebacker-looking guy who looked like he could be Sanji's funhouse mirror reflection.Didn't he had a class with that guy this semester?He couldn't remember.  

 

That creepy-as-hell Trafuckhead Law guy was there, too.He always complained about how he was too busy for Luffy to keep asking him to hang out, but he was still there _all the time_ anyway.Every time Zoro saw him, Law's dead fish eyes seemed to be following Luffy, and it kind of pissed him off.Even when Luffy plopped down in the stool next to him, slamming down a bottle of Crown and insisting Zoro do a shot with him, Law's eyes found him. 

 

After Luffy left, Zoro probably should've grabbed a bottle of something and headed up to his room, but there was some really loud, bass-y music playing that shook the whole house, and it probably felt a hell of a lot worse upstairs.It was easier to just deal with it down here.  

 

Resting his chin in his hands, elbows on the countertop, Zoro also realized his head was spinning a little bit.He hoped that meant he was drunk. Although his mood hadn't improved any.

 

He never did get drunk enough, but eventually, people started to leave and Zoro gave up and went to bed.  

 

When he woke up the next morning, Zoro set his feet on the floor, squinting as he looked around his room.All of the books and papers that had been on his desk were laying in a mess on the floor.He didn't remember doing that.

 

The door to his room suddenly burst open.“Hey, Zoro!” Luffy shouted, looking surprisingly awake even though he'd probably been up nearly all night.

 

Zoro blinked a couple of times before he managed to nod at him.

 

“Wanna go somewhere with me tonight?”

 

“Uh...”He wracked his brain for an excuse, but he didn't really have a reason to say no.

 

And when they left they night, Luffy didn't really offer much explanation to where they were going, and Zoro didn't ask.It was a little hard to talk riding tandem on Luffy's vespa, anyway—he wasn't even sure if it was legal.

 

They wound up in a slightly seedier part of town, pulling in front of a restaurant advertising that food was served till eleven, but the bar was open till two.Zoro narrowed his eyes at he looked up at the flickering blue neon lights—the Mermaid Cafe.He didn't think he'd ever heard of it before.

 

“Are we... eating dinner?”Zoro asked slowly, as they slipped in through the creaky single-door.It was pretty busy—but it wasn't too surprising, since the parking lot had been jam-packed.

 

“Nah, I don't have any money right now.But I'll buy us something later.”

 

Zoro's one question had let to several more, but whatever, sometimes with Luffy it was easier to just follow along than try and make sense of the stuff he said.And as Luffy led him down a hallway and opened a small, nondescript door that Zoro would've assumed was just a broom closet, the questions just kept on growing.

 

There was a rickety looking stairwell through that door, and Zoro could immediately hear a lot of noise coming from down there—frantic shouting, booming laughter, cheering, swearing.They found a huge crowd at the bottom, many of them middle-aged and older, and mostly men.  

 

What the fuck was this place?

 

There was a bar at one corner of the room, but the focus was on the center of the room.As they got a little closer, Zoro realized it was roped off into some kind of make-shift boxing ring—and there were two men slugging it out in the center of it.

 

“Did we just walk into Fight Club?” Zoro muttered, mostly to himself.

 

Luffy cracked his knuckles and grinned.“Wanna see me kick someone's ass?”

 

“You're serious,” Zoro said, after a beat.

 

“Yeah, and you should bet on me.I'm definitely going to win.”Luffy gave him a cheesy thumbs up and Zoro found himself unconsciously thumbing at the wallet in his back pocket—maybe his confidence was a little too convincing.

 

“Am I supposed to call you Tyler Durden now or something?”

 

“It's only after we've lost everything that we're free to do anything,” Luffy said with his manic smile.

 

Zoro raised his eyebrows.“You watch things that aren't alien documentaries?”

 

“Sometimes,” Luffy laughed.“It's one of Trafunnelcake's favorite movies.”

 

Well.Zoro was Jack's complete lack of surprise.

 

There were actually several matches before it was Luffy's turn—apparently the schedule was determined well in advance, not just a bunch of guys spur-of-the-moment deciding they wanted to try it out.Not _quite_ a fight club.Zoro found himself watching with increasing interest—he'd sort of  watched boxing matches on TV before, but this was his first time seeing it live.  

 

The basics were the same, although they were obviously a little more lax about some of rules—like about blood, goddamn.Even though one of the guys in the ring had a cut above his eyebrow and his whole face was just _covered_ in it, they weren't stopping the match.

 

Luffy left to go get ready, and okay, why the hell not, Zoro went ahead and bet all the loose bills he had on him.He was already broke, so it wasn't like it was going to make a difference.

 

And then it was time.Luffy's opponent was a lot bigger than him, and Zoro gathered another rule they must've been lax about was weight classes—because Luffy was _maybe_ a featherweight, lightweight at best, and this guy was at least a middleweight.Zoro gnawed at his lower lip, holding his breath until the bell finally rang.

  
The fight was over in six rounds.And for 18 minutes, Zoro's eyes never left the ring.  
  
The basement was dirty and gritty and smelled like old beer and stale cigarettes.The yellow, hazy light barely provided enough visibility, and some of the old bulbs would flicker off from time to time.  
  
Despite all that, it felt like one of the most incredible things Zoro had ever seen.  
  
Luffy's opponent was big, but he couldn't do anything against Luffy's speed.He'd aim a punch, and Luffy would effortlessly duck, weave out of the way, jump back.At one point, Luffy sprang up from far down below him, landing a nasty uppercut.The opponent had a hook that made Zoro clench his jaw every time he swung it, but it never so much as grazed Luffy.

 

Zoro wasn't sure what was worse for the opponent, honestly—the fact that Luffy was goddamn smiling the whole time, like he was playing a game, or that every time Luffy hit him, it rattled his fucking teeth.After a couple of hits to the head, he was spitting blood.  

 

Obviously neither he—nor Zoro—suspected that a guy Luffy's size packed a punch like that.

  
A few seconds before the sixth round ended,  Luffy was declared the winner.A KO victory.Some people cheered and screamed, others cursed, and Zoro just stared.

 

His heart was pounding and he didn't even understand why.

 

Luffy disappeared for a bit, and Zoro realized he actually had some money to collect. It was only after he shoved four twenty dollar bills into his wallet that he realized he'd probably done something illegal.Far more illegal than riding double on a Vespa.Oh well.

 

When he found Luffy again, he was standing at the back, chatting with a big guy with an angry expression—and shit, actually, big was an understatement.The girth of him was almost inhuman, like maybe the biggest guy he'd ever seen, and he was wearing a Hawaiian shirt that was loud as hell, and his tanned arm was covered in some kind of tribal tattoo.

 

Then Hawaiian-shirt-guy handed Luffy a _fat_ stack of cash, and Zoro's mouth unintentionally fell open a little.Cramming the bills in his pockets, Luffy noticed Zoro and started waving wildly, like he was across the room from him instead of less than twelve feet away.  

 

“Hey, Zoro! Come meet my friend Jinbei!”

  
Zoro quickly walked toward him, if only to stop that exaggerated waving, and nodded at the large man, Jinbei, for a second as he approached, which was about as much of a greeting as he gave anybody.But Jinbei got pulled aside almost immediately—Zoro assumed he was in charge of whatever this was—and it was just Zoro and Luffy again.  

 

“So you get paid for doing this?” Zoro asked, barely stopping himself from asking how much.

 

“Sure, when you win.The loser doesn't get anything, though, ”Luffy smiled nonchalantly and Zoro got the feeling that he wasn't too worried about losing.“You wanna stay for a little bit?It's kind of fun to watch these fights, and I want to hang out with Jinbei some more.”

 

Zoro didn't have anything better to do, so he and Luffy got a couple bottles of bad beer and loitered near Jinbei, who now had a much larger group around him.There were almost no seats in the basement, except for a few hightops with chairs near the back, which was probably for the best.People were swarming the ring.  
  
“So, uh, is this what you do for a living?” Zoro finally asked.They had all wondered at some point just what the hell Luffy did—the weird hours, the way he'd disappear for a few days, the way he'd sometimes sort of look like he'd slept on the street.  
  
“Yeah, sometimes.Maybe every couple of weeks?”  
  
“Huh.”They watched the next match, which wasn't as interesting as Luffy's—two guys sloppily slugging it out, neither of them very good—about as much as he'd expect out of a probably-illegal underground boxing match.  

 

“How come you never talk about it?”

 

“You know, Zoro, the first rule of fight club is we don't talk about—”

 

“Stop,” Zoro held up his hand, and he almost cracked a smile.“ How'd you start doing this, though?”

  
“ Why, you interested?” Luffy grinned.

The question took Zoro by surprise.It wasn't why he'd asked, but his mind drifted to the way he felt when that bell rang, when Luffy pumped his fist into the air...His heart thumped as he thought about fencing—about how the only time he'd ever done well at anything in his life was when he relied on his muscles and his reflexes.

 

He hesitated before he finally asked,  “Is it something you can just do?” 

 

“Yeah.Well, sure, _you_ can do it.You just sign up and come here.”

 

“That's it?”

 

“That's all I ever do,” Luffy shrugged.Suddenly he turned around, toward Jinbei, who was clearly in the middle of a conversation, and shouted, “Hey, Jinbei! Can my friend Zoro be in a match?”

 

The room was deafeningly loud, but the collective volume of well over a hundred people shouting was no match for Luffy's lungs, and Jinbei turned to look at him very pointedly, before turning toward Zoro, looking at him up and down.

 

Jinbei had very clearly been in the middle of something—and Luffy asked him like he was asking his dad if a friend could sleep over—but Zoro couldn't tell if Jinbei was irritated or just had a naturally pissed-off-looking face.  

 

Either way, once he'd finished his business, he came over to talk to them.Jinbei gave Luffy a long look, and Zoro couldn't help but notice his frown was impressively deep.  

 

“Is he any good?” Jinbei finally spoke.

 

“Of course he is! You should see him fence, it's _amazing_.”

 

“Fence?”The frown got somehow deeper as Jinbei shifted his eyes toward Zoro. “You ever box before?”

 

“No.”

 

Jinbei shook his head and turned back to Luffy.“I can't put just anyone in there, Luffy.He could hurt himself.”

 

“Nah, Zoro can handle it,” Luffy insisted.“He's really strong and he won, like, a fencing gold medal or something last year, he's incredible.”

 

“A gold medal,” Jinbei repeated.

 

“A tournament,” Zoro replied quickly—probably a good idea to clear up _that_ misunderstanding.  

 

“You ever been in a fight before?”

 

“Not really.”Zoro thought about it.“A couple schoolyard fights, maybe.”

 

“And?”

 

Zoro scrunched his eyebrows a bit—was he asking what happened?“I was a lot better off than the other guys.”

 

Jinbei's stare was uncomfortably long, but it was enough for Zoro to decide that the guy just had a naturally unfriendly expression.When Jinbei turned to Luffy, his expression had actually softened quite a bit. 

 

“Make sure he knows what he's doing,” Jinbei told him.  

 

“You bet,” Luffy assured, giving Jinbei an aggressive pat on his thick arm, and Zoro came to the conclusion that Luffy had some weird friends.

 

The two of them chatted for a little bit, and when they left, Zoro was scheduled for a fight on the first weekend of February.As they stepped outside into the brisk winter air, Zoro couldn't help but smile to himself. 

 

 

* * *

 

 

_"The lifetime of a human being is measured by decades. The lifetime of the Sun is a hundred million times longer."_

 

"Hey, guys?" 

 

Nami and Usopp looked over from their spots on either end of the largest couch. They both had thick books in their laps, and notebooks and folders and pens scattered about. The television in front of them was turned on with the volume cranked up. 

 

Nami hadn't looked down at her lap for awhile now.

 

“What's up?” Usopp asked, yawning loudly—he'd probably been half-asleep.

 

_"Compared to a star, we are like mayflies, fleeting ephemeral creatures who live out their lives in the course of a single day."_

 

Chopper cleared his throat, talking over the documentary blaring behind him. 

 

"You guys both don't have class or work today, right?" he asked. 

 

"Not today, no," Nami said cautiously, spinning her pen between her fingers. 

 

"So... would you guys consider doing me a really big favor?" His gaze fell to the ground, and he wrung his hands together, his fluffy chocolate brown hair falling in his face—his grandma had cut it for him when he'd been away for the holidays, but it was getting kind of shaggy again, which was a really fricking adorable look for him—and Nami bit her bottom lip.

 

She and Usopp glanced at each other, and she could tell he was obviously thinking the same thing as her.Chopper actually didn't ask for a lot—mostly he asked _not_ do things, like going to a party, or playing a six-hour-long game of drunk monopoly.  

 

Whatever he was about to ask, they both obviously knew they were going to have a hard time saying no.Dammit.Her spot on the couch was so comfortable, too.

 

An hour later, they were being shoved around the hallway of a crowded convention center—like surprisingly crowded, why the hell were so many people her for some kind of medical expo or whatever it was?

 

“There's no reason for me to be here,” Nami repeated for maybe the fourth time, only loudly enough for Usopp's ears.“You're the one with the car, I should've stayed home.”

 

“You're here out of the kindness and generosity of your heart,” Usopp said flatly, and Nami snorted. “You're my emotional support, so I don't just lie down on the ground and let all these people trample me to death.”

 

“I'll lay down and get trampled if you will.”

 

“Look, here it is!” Chopper shouted from several feet up ahead, spinning around and waving his arms excitedly at a sign up ahead.He looked like a kid about to go to Disneyland.“The lecture I was telling you about—about how viruses can be used to destroy tumors!”  

 

“He's so damn _cute_ ,” Nami gritted her teeth. 

 

Usopp nodded in agreement.“I know, this is literally hell.I'm gonna punch myself in the face.”

 

“Same,” Nami sighed, then she considered it.“No, actually, I'm going to punch _you_ in the face.”

 

“Do you think they serve alcohol here?”

 

“If only.”

 

“I should invest in a flask.”

 

She made a face at him.“God, please don't be _that_ douchebag.”

 

“Come on!” Chopper shouted. “We're not going to get a good seat if we don't hurry.”

 

Usopp smiled wryly, shaking his head. "He's like a different species." 

 

"He's definitely not human. Humans aren't that blissfully naïve and excited over life past age six." 

The group just barely found three seats together—there were surprisingly few open—and settled down just in time, apparently. The presentation began not five minutes later. 

 

It was as exciting as all three of them had anticipated it would be. 

 

Nami turned the brightness on her phone screen down and discreetly became involved in a terrible game she'd secretly gotten a little obsessed with. Chopper, sitting to her left, was taking notes and leaning forward in his seat, like literally hanging off of the edge of it at times.And Usopp, on her right, slouched in his chair and fell asleep after twenty minutes, his arms folded and chin resting on his chest. 

 

She was actually a little envious—she wished she could just pass out like that in the uncomfortable plastic chair.Nami stared down at her phone screen and thought about how it'd been... it had been really weird lately.With everything.  

 

But she felt better than she had in a while, and it was because of Usopp.Him being there with her.She probably couldn’t have kept going, if it wasn’t for him.

 

It took nearly a half hour for Chopper to catch onto Usopp's nap.Reaching over Nami, he poked him in the arm, hard, and Usopp jolted awake.

 

"Could you be any more rude! These people are geniuses! You're in the same room as the people who could potentially develop technology that saves countless lives! And they're your age, you know, you should be _inspired_." Chopper hissed. 

 

Usopp sat up a little straighter, rubbing his eyes, mumbling, "Okay, Jesus, I'm a—” 

 

His lips stopped moving as he stared at the speakers at the podium—a  tall boy, clean shaven with messy hair and an unfortunate-looking tie, and a much shorter girl with blonde hair and a soft voice.They'd been alternating speaking, and it was the girl standing at the mic right now.Usopp sat up a little straighter, narrowing his eyes.

 

"Which one of them do you know?" Nami whispered.

 

His eyes snapped to hers immediately, a little wide. "What?" 

 

It had just been a hunch, too. “You know one of them." 

 

"What makes you say that?" 

 

"Well, I didn't know for sure, but I do now—look at you." 

 

"What?" Chopper asked, surprised, reaching over Nami to grab Usopp's arm. "You know one of them? Who? And _how?_ "

 

“Uh, from school,” he said vaguely.

 

“It's the girl,” Nami grinned, turning to Chopper.

 

“I didn't say—” 

 

“I can tell by that look on your fucking face, it's that pretty girl!” Nami whispered triumphantly, and Chopper was still leaning over her, his eyes wide.“Were you close? Were you friends?”

 

“Uh, well, I mean, I guess—” 

“Did you have a crush on her?Or did you date?” Nami laughed a little under her breath, “Was she your first love?”

 

Usopp bit his lip, hard.  

 

Nami's smile faded a little.“Wait, are you fucking serious?”

 

Chopper leaned forward a little farther, practically falling into Nami's lap."Can you _introduce me?_ " 

 

“Probably not,” Usopp replied.  

 

But, at the end of the presentation, the speakers announced that they'd be available for questions at one of the booths set up in another part of the convention center, so it seemed they had their window.Usopp looked—strange.And Nami wasn't sure what to think.

 

Nearly an hour later, they walked down a hallway full of smart-looking people, and Chopper was bouncing on his toes as he craned his neck, looking around wildly. 

 

“Let's go down this way!” he shouted at them.

 

"So, were you and her—what's her name, Kaya?Were you two together long?" Nami asked, as she and Usopp trailed behind, walking side by side.It was the first question she'd asked since they'd been in the auditorium, even though there were so many things she wanted to know, and there was a piece of her that felt—huh.She couldn't put it to words.

 

"Kaya, yeah. And, awhile," he answered, his hands jammed in his pockets. They were supposed to be looking for her so Chopper could meet her and probably launch a hundred questions at her rapid-fire. Usopp didn't seem to be looking very hard. His gaze was fixed on some point straight ahead of him, unmoving. 

 

"Awhile, as in what?A few months?”

 

"A few years," he said lightly, vague as hell, and Nami furrowed her brow. 

 

"Hey, Usopp! Isn't that her!" Chopper asked suddenly, doubling back towards them, grabbing Usopp's shoulder and turning his body a bit, pointing through the crowd.

 

Nami watched his eyes settle on her, and she saw that same sad recognition he'd worn during the seminar after he'd first seen her.

 

As the three of them walked a little closer to her, Nami trailed behind them, not really sure what to expect.Things must not have ended _that_ badly, if Usopp was willing to approach her at all—but dating someone for a few _years_ , that was kind of unfathomable for her, and she couldn't imagine everything would be sunshine and rainbows to just stroll up to each other like it was nothing.How could Usopp not have told her about this earlier? 

 

Was it Usopp's fault they broke up?He could be a pretty clueless dork sometimes, so it wouldn't be too surprising—maybe this girl held a grudge against him.What if she was going to go crazy on him?She seemed pretty shy when she was speaking, but sometimes it was the quiet ones...

 

Kaya was talking to a group of middle-aged men in khakis and polo shirts, a polite, docile expression painted on her face as she patiently nodded, listening to each of them taking turns speaking.After a moment, she glanced in their direction—and suddenly, her face just totally lit up when she saw Usopp, like practically _glowed_.

 

Not really the negative reaction Nami had been expecting.Well.

 

Kaya eagerly waved her hand at Usopp, mouthing something that looked like, “Wait there,” and she had this big, dimply smile on her face—and damn, she was _hella_ cute, Nami could not deny it.That adorable kind of cute that would've made Nami want to just squeeze her, if they were better friends.  

 

Nami glanced at Chopper, whose eyes were flitting back and forth between Usopp and Kaya, his hands cupped over his mouth like he couldn't even believe this moment was really happening to him; she hoped he wasn't hyperventilating but he probably was.

 

Yep. Kaya was probably Chopper-level cute, at least.  

 

When Kaya finally excused herself from the group, she rushed over to Usopp, smiling even wider now, hesitating for a beat before giving him a hug in greeting—the restrained familiarity of it was hard to miss and Nami was starting to get a better picture of the history between them.Her fingers twitched.

 

“What are you doing here, Usopp?” Kaya asked, a little breathlessly, her hands coming to his shoulders. He was considerably taller than her.Kaya was even shorter than she'd first thought—about Chopper's height, with her high heels.

 

Usopp smiled at her, and Nami knew he was uneasy, and she realized that this other girl knew it too. She could tell, the way this girl's concern was showing on her face.She wore her emotions on her sleeve.Like he did. 

 

"Actually, I got forced into coming by my friend here," Usopp nodded to Chopper, who was nearly vibrating as he stood next to her, trying to contain himself. "He's a big admirer of yours, apparently.Kaya, this is Chopper.He's one of my roommates.”

 

Kaya instantly outstretched her hand, in that delicate, submissive way that shy women tended to shake hands, and she had the social grace of someone who'd experienced a lifetime of polite introductions.Nami was pretty sure Chopper's hand was trembling a little bit as it met hers.

 

“It's a pleasure to meet you, Chopper,” Kaya said, smiling courteously.  

 

“Y-you too,” Chopper stuttered a little, and Nami could tell he'd been holding his breath. Nami raised her eyebrows a bit, but then Kaya's hand was in front of her and she couldn't think about it too much.

 

“I'm Nami,” she said, and for some reason, she felt the need to add, “I live with them, too.” 

 

“Nice to meet you you, Nami.”Her smile was so bright, Nami blanked for a split second.  

 

“You too,” Nami unintentionally repeated the same words as Chopper; it was all she could say.She was a little off-put by people with impeccable manners, and it was very obvious Kaya was one of them.Nami glanced over at Usopp, and he was trying his best to remain totally expressionless.

 

“Did you enjoy the presentation?”

 

Nami would've probably been in trouble with that one, but Chopper was all over it.He lost his control and started just _gushing,_ even worse than how he was with Traflorida Law, asking about five questions at once, repeating over and over how incredible her work was, and how much he'd learned, and what a great influence she'd been to him. 

 

Kaya laughed and the sound was like a wind chime, light like the morning air, warm like a summer evening, and Usopp glanced over at her and Nami felt a little sick. 

 

Someone shoved past Nami, pushing her forward slightly, and she actually had to catch herself from turning around and giving whoever it was a violent push back—obviously that person hadn't meant it, they were just trying to get by, but she was feeling _really annoyed_ about it for no reason at all, and man, it was getting crowded as _fuck_ in there.

 

“Are you okay?” Kaya asked, her voice gushing with concern, like _she_ had been the one who had bumped into Nami instead of some random stranger.“It's probably going to start getting really busy in here now.All of the other lectures are getting done, so people usually start to congregate by all the booths.”

“We should let you go, anyway,” Usopp broke in. “I bet you have a lot of people who are dying to talk to you.”Sarcastic words, but they sounded sincere as Usopp looked down at Kaya, his lips carved into a slight frown.

 

“Oh, I didn't mean that,” Kaya said quickly. _Really_ quickly.“I just meant it'll make it a little hard to have much of a conversation.”

 

“Then maybe we should all go get some coffee or something?” Chopper blurted, _way_ too loud, jutting his head in between them, obviously totally unaware of the weird little bubble that'd just been forming around them, and okay, it was actually kind of funny, and Nami pressed a hand to her mouth trying to hold back a snort.Chopper didn't even really like coffee all that much, unless it was totally loaded with cream and sugary flavor syrups and topped with a big heaping pile of whipped cream—although to be fair, that was her favorite way to drink it, too.

 

Usopp turned toward him.“Chopper, I'm sure Kaya can't—”

 

“That'd be wonderful,” Kaya cut him off.“Could you give me about ten minutes to wrap up here?”

 

And so, Nami found herself walking into a surprisingly deserted Starbucks just outside of the convention center, with Chopper, Usopp, and Usopp's ex of god-only-knows how long who she'd never even heard of until just an hour or so before.

 

Well, it wasn't like it was the weirdest situation she'd been in lately.She wasn't sure why she felt like it was a little hard to take deep breaths right now—probably lack of sleep, or something—but she may as well make the best out of it.Maybe Kaya'd shed light on what Usopp was hiding.In fact—she realized she'd better seize the opportunity.

 

Once they all had their coffees, they headed to a table near the back corner, and Nami sat right next to Kaya, which merited a look from Usopp.Chopper sat across from Kaya, already looking fidgety, and Usopp looked a little withdrawn.

 

“So, Chopper, you're a medical student?” Kaya opened with.

 

“Yes.Well, no.I mean, I will be, but—I'm premed right now.”Chopper stumbled over his words like she'd asked him a trick question.It was actually pretty cute.Nami's gaze shifted to Kaya, who was laughing again, before she turned to Nami to ask her what she was did—or studied.

 

Eugh, Nami hated small talk.Luckily Chopper hijacked the conversation pretty early on, and for awhile, Nami happily let the two of them go through medical jargon as she sipped at her peppermint mocha latte, far more interested in what wasn't being said than what was. 

 

After a while, though, she began feeling a little bit antsy, impatient to start getting to all of the questions she had.But she had to wait for the right moment to chime in and start steering the conversation in the direction she wanted, and god, it was kind of incredible how long Chopper could keep it up when he was talking to someone as enthusiastic about medical shit as he was.

 

Finally, there was like four seconds of silence.That was all Nami needed.

 

She opened with personal questions, leading up to Kaya's history with Usopp—Nami thought it might make him uncomfortable, but Usopp didn't really have much of a reaction at all.He seemed a little zoned out, staring down at the whipped cream of his drink like it was doing something more interesting than melting.  

 

“You guys dated for quite awhile—a few years, right?”  

 

“Yes, almost four.”

 

Four.Jesus.And Kaya hadn't needed to stop and count, either.

 

“Most of high school, basically,” Kaya added.

 

Nami smiled, forced it, as she leaned forward, asking in a slightly hushed voice, even though it was obvious Usopp could hear her, “So what was he like back then?”

 

“Um, what do you want to know?” 

 

“Anything interesting.How'd you guys meet?”

 

“Oh, um, well we'd known each other since we were kids.”  

 

“Childhood friends,” Nami hummed. “When did you start dating?”

 

“The summer before high school.”Kaya answered directly and on point, but she didn't offer anything else.

 

Nami noticed out of the corner of her eye that Usopp was giving her a look like he wished she'd stop.It was the most expressive he'd been for this entire conversation.

 

Nami _didn't_ stop, but she didn't ask that much more, either.She was starting to feel like maybe she didn't know much about Usopp at all and—ugh, she just felt off.Why did she feel so off?

 

Kaya was polite and respectful and kept turning to Usopp for confirmation that she could answer questions.It was _weird_. She wasn't even sure if it was weird because Kaya was concerned about saying something out of turn, or because Kaya and Usopp had agreed to sit and talk like this in the first place.

 

Nami probably wouldn't have wanted to sit down and reminisce with someone she'd dated for practically a quarter of her life.A fifth.Whatever.And if for some ridiculous fucking reason she did, she would've probably used the opportunity to dig up things about her ex's currentlife. 

 

But Kaya didn't ask that much.In fact, Kaya probably knew more about what was up with Chopper than Usopp—there were several stretches where neither Usopp nor Nami even said anything for several minutes.

 

Nami wondered how Kaya would react if she found out what Usopp had gotten himself involved in over the past couple weeks. She felt a little sick at the thought.

 

When Kaya finally had to excuse herself to go meet back up with her doctor friends, Nami nearly fell across the table in relief.She'd maybe never been so ready to get the frick out of someplace.

 

“It was a really nice surprise to see you, Usopp,” Kaya told him, giving him a hug that seemed to last a little on the long side, and Nami crossed her arms and stared at something particularly riveting happening outside the window.

 

And then, fuck, Kaya almost made a move like she was going to hug _her_ good-bye, but she must've thought better of it at the last second, because instead, she offered her hand.Well, she had to be a smart girl, doing the whole medical school thing.And it was probably good for Chopper, too—Nami was pretty sure his little heart couldn't have handled a hug from Kaya, based on the starstruck look on his face as he got to shake her hand for the second time that day.Nami could almost see how sweaty his palms probably were.

 

The ride home felt way too long.Chopper talked almost non-stop, so there was no awkward silence, but Nami wasn't really following along with whatever he was saying.  

 

She was thinking about how, for all the questions she'd asked, she had no clue why those two broke up in the first place.There were no overwhelming feelings between them she'd really picked up on—any kind of wistful longing or seething anger.Just a weird sense of neutrality, like they didn't want to avoid each other, but they didn'thave any desire to be around each other, either.It was so fucking _weird._  

 

What the hell had happened?It was the one question she couldn't quit bring herself to ask Kaya—but she had plans to march right up to Usopp's room when they got home and ask him point-blank. And that was exactly what she did.

 

Usopp laid back on his bed, covering his eyes with the crook of his elbow.“We just stopped dating.”

 

Nami sat down on his desk chair, crossing her arms.“That's not how that works, Usopp.Breaking up with a person isn't like suddenly waking up one morning and deciding you're sick of cake and never want to eat it again—”

 

“That would never happen,” Usopp said gravely.

 

“That's not my point,” she said sharply.

 

“I know—I get your point.”Usopp signed, moving his arms behind his head and glancing over at her, and he looked so damn tired at that moment.“We _talked_ about it, it's just not really all that interesting of a story.We had different things we wanted to do, and it made more sense to break up than to be together.”

 

Nami leaned on his desk, cupping her head in her hands as she contemplated what he'd said.Considering how he was just as wishy-washy about his future as she was, it was probably a hell of a lot less anticlimactic to him than he made it sound.

 

“I can't believe you never told me you dated someone for _four years_.That's kind of crazy.”

 

He shrugged, turning on his side, facing her properly now, and she looked down and stared at the scratched plywood of the desktop.“I wasn't trying to keep it from you, it just never came up.”

 

“I just don't understand how someone can be that big a part of your life for so long and you don't even talk about her.”

 

"Yeah," Usopp said, a bit quietly.

 

Something about the inflection in his voice made her look over at him.

 

“The last time I went to an amusement park,” Usopp started, “a friend's shoes got stolen while we were on one of those rides with the shoe cubby thing, and I had to go to three different gift shops to find a pair of flip flops.”

 

“What?”

 

“My foster parents wouldn't let me keep my mom's old car in their driveway.The only reason it didn't get sold off was because I was able to store it at a friend's house until I could drive it.”

 

She squinted at him.“Are you having a stoke?”These were all old stories he'd told her before.

 

“I tried to teach someone how to drive stick in my car once, but I just couldn't do it—it scared the hell out of me that the car was going to get fucked up.”

 

Nami clenched her jaw, realizing what he was doing.“Okay.”

 

“I used to know someone who was a lot like Chopper, only a little less intense.”

 

“ _Okay_ , I get it.”She looked down at her hands, taking a deep breath. “They're all her.”

 

“You _are_ right—it's impossible to date someone that long and not talk about them,” Usopp shrugged. 

 

“Why the hell didn't you say it was your ex girlfriend though?”

 

“Because it didn't really matter for any of those stories.I mean, usually I brought it up because we were talking about something similar.Wouldn't it be a little weird if I kept saying 'my ex' every time I talked about something that happened to me when I was a teenager?”

 

“Well, yeah, but—that's not the point.”

 

He flopped on his back again, hands tucked behind his neck and elbows in the air.“I would've mentioned it before, if I knew it'd bother you.”

 

“It doesn't bother me....”

 

Usopp rolled his eyes.

 

“It just makes me wonder what else I don't know about you.”

 

“I have a banana-shaped birthmark on my ass.”

 

“I know about that.”

 

“ _How?_ ”

 

Nami shrugged.“You wear loose pants and I've seen you drunk a lot.”

 

“Jesus.”

 

Usopp proceeded to try to come up with more things about him that Nami maybe didn't know—and he actually looked a little genuinely surprised when she already knew most of it.And he knew a lot about her, too, it seemed. 

 

She bit her lower lip, her eyes drifting to the dusty corner of the room between Usopp's desk and the wall.Usopp knew the worst thing about her—she had straight dragged him into it with her—but he was still here, trying to cheer her up.  

 

As he told her about how he'd been pretty good with a slingshot in the middle school, Nami thought it almost seemed like nothing was wrong at all.

 

 

* * *

 

 

The month of January was nearly over and Usopp already hated his new schedule. 

 

He had a gap between classes a couple days a week that lasted for a few hours, and it stretched the day out, and today was one of those days, and normally, he’d try to get some school crap done, or something, but today was not his day in general. 

 

He closed his textbook and sat hunched over the old worn out desk in his room, and he felt like he was crawling out of his goddamn skin. 

 

Alright, so he wasn’t going to get any homework done. He was ultimately wasting his time. 

 

He could go to his lab early and try to get some work done there. That wasn’t an awful idea. 

 

As he pulled the front door open, backpack slung over his shoulder, he was a little surprised to hear people were outside. All of the snow on the ground had melted days ago, but it was still freaking cold outside, and they had a perfectly comfortable living room.

 

At first, he heard Brook's laugh, which was as bizarre-sounding as usual. But the majority of the noise was actually coming from Luffy and Zoro—mostly Luffy, but then, that was pretty normal. Usopp's jaw fell open just a little as he paused to stare at the two of them, his hand still on the doorknob.

 

They were standing in the middle of the front lawn, staring at each other and bouncing on their feet, fists raised, like they were sizing each other up. Suddenly, Luffy ducked down and lunged forward, his right hand tucked in a tight fist, and Zoro jumped back barely in the knick of time to avoid a nasty uppercut, only to have Luffy's left pop him right in the chin a second later. Usopp flinched.

 

Brook laughed even louder. “He got you good that time.”

 

Usopp spun toward Nami, who was sitting on the porch. “Uh, what's going on?”

 

He felt like his what-the-fuck moment was pretty justified, but Nami actually couldn't have looked any more disinterested, legs dangling off the front of the porch as she hugged a parka around herself.

 

“Luffy's teaching Zoro how to box,” she replied, like it was an everyday occurrence or something. He studied her for a moment, and god, she looked so tired lately, it kind of hurt him to look at her.

 

“Why?” 

 

She shrugged. “Zoro’s got a match, or something. Whatever they call it.” 

 

“… I see,” Usopp said, frowning deeply, because that still didn't really make sense. Like, he'd never heard Zoro even mention boxing before—and if Luffy was teaching him, then obviously, it wasn't something Zoro had done before. And why did Luffy know how to box?

 

Okay, fine, everyone was up to weird shit lately, and he wasn't really ready to digest this new piece of information right now. He told Nami he was heading to class, and started walking toward his car.

 

“You're picking me up from work tonight, right?” she called after him.

 

“When do you get off?”

 

“One.”

 

He had to be at work at six in the morning tomorrow. “Yeah, see you then.”

Usopp's class was this engineering lab thing that he had to take as part of his major. The professor always rotated, but this semester, he'd lucked out because Professor Franky was teaching it.

 

And it was especially helpful right now. For awhile, Franky's energy managed to keep Usopp focused on class and his current project, which were the things he needed to focus on. He'd been working on building an engine that he'd dreamed up while he was taking thermodynamics last semester, which he was making really good progress on.

 

For a while, anyway. 

 

But now that he was getting pretty far into the project and regularly testing its output, there was obviously something wrong and… Usopp couldn’t fucking deal with it today. 

 

The more he messed with it, the more he made it worse. Standard. 

 

He sat back in his chair and stared past his stupid engine, and he thought about how impressive it was that he wasn’t in prison at the moment. He was so reliable for fucking up, it was bound to happen eventually, with the rate he and Nami were going. They went out and did the whole GTA thing a few nights a week, and it was actually becoming routine, which was pretty goddamn insane. 

 

Usopp swallowed back a wave of nausea, which he was getting great at doing, and looked back at his engine. His eyes were burning while he tried to pull his mind back onto a happy, safe, solution-oriented train of thought. 

 

Engine. Right. 

 

His whole brain hurt. 

 

He tried to think of what the hell he was doing that was consistently making this engine perform worse and worse, but absolutely nothing was coming to mind—which was actually kind of rare, he was actually pretty proud, usually, of being able to think of answers. Or at least bullshit his way through things. 

 

Not this time, though. Maybe he’d lost his ability. Maybe he’d just snapped and now he was all broken and wouldn’t be able to figure out anything anymore. 

 

Okay, no. He was fine. Calm down. 

 

Usopp wanted very much to go back home and pass out for maybe a month or a decade. 

 

Instead of thinking about how to fix his engine and pass his lab, he wound up staring off into space and daydreaming about how he wished he had the super power to stop time so he could just lay down and take a long nap and fix everything in his life and in Nami’s life when he woke up at his leisure. 

 

Usopp actually kind of thought he might start crying in the middle of the fucking classroom. 

 

He took a deep breath, and he leaned forward to try to screw with his engine a little more, but he wound up dropping his wrench, and it clattered on the floor, and Jesus, shit, he couldn’t even _hold a fucking wrench_. He was actually going to break down and start crying over a goddamn wrench. 

 

No. No, he was okay. 

 

He was fine. 

 

When he was a kid, he actually probably could’ve gotten away with just crying. He did that sort of thing a lot—had a lot of emotional outbursts, especially after his mom had died. He was a kid, though, and people put up with it. It was normal for him to run screaming and crying if he was scared. It was normal for him to shout if he was angry. Kids did that shit. 

 

But he was an adult now, and he had to keep it together. 

 

He couldn’t just break down. And he couldn’t make any stupid mistakes. 

 

It was different when he was a kid. If he screwed up, he was just supposed to learn from it. He was actually consoled when he messed up. But now, if he screwed up, he could fail out of school, or he could get fired from his job, fall further into debt, never land a good enough career to pay his bills, wind up homeless. Or worse. 

 

God. 

 

It was a large, warm hand squeezing his shoulder that jerked him out of his dangerous tailspin, forcing him back to reality. He couldn't help but jolt in surprise, his palms slapping down on the surface of the table.

 

“Hey, are you okay?”  Franky's voice, normally loud and booming, was quieter than he'd ever heard it before.

 

“Uh, yeah, I’m great.” His voice was a little unsteady. Great. Real fucking believable.

 

Franky frowned, pursing his eyebrows together. “You were looking super intense for awhile.”

 

Damn, maybe Nami was right when she told him he had a terrible poker face. And right now, that wasn’t really acceptable. Forcing an air of nonchalance, Usopp leaned back in his chair, and the struggle to come off as the least bit relaxed was difficult as hell. 

 

“Oh. It’s—nothing. I’m just a pretty big worrier sometimes.” 

 

“Well, yeah, I know that.” Franky replied as though Usopp had just told him the sky was blue or something. Grabbing a nearby chair, he scraped it toward Usopp's table, heaving himself down in the seat. “So, tell me what's going on.”

 

Usopp inwardly panicked, his eyes searching the room, like a viable excuse was going to be written somewhere on the walls. And he was surprised to see the room was empty—he was the only one left in there. But, okay, an excuse—oh, his project. That would work. “It's this goddamn engine I've been working on—I messed something up earlier and I can't figure out what's wrong.”

 

The most believable lies had some basis in truth.

 

Oh, shit, he didn’t mean to cuss in front of a teacher. 

 

Whoops. 

 

Franky glanced at it for a second. Like literally a second. Maybe two, tops. Barely looked at the thing. But then, very matter-of-factly, he said, “It's the crankshaft.”

 

“What?”

 

“You're barely getting any power, right?”

 

“Yeah.” Exactly the problem—how the heck did he know?

 

“Losing force with every test?”

 

Usopp raised his eyebrows. “Uh, yeah, exactly.”

 

“It's the compounding damage—with each test, it's getting just a little more out of whack. Normally it'd be fine, but with all the modifications you made, it's distorting. You need something made out of a studier material.”

 

“I haven't noticed any damage, though—” Usopp started to say, already starting to pull some of the pieces apart, until he could get a better look at the crankshaft—and damn. Yep. “Oh.” 

 

“I've been doing this engineering thing for a pretty long time, you know.”

 

“I can tell,” Usopp said. It would've probably taken him hours—or days—to notice that.

 

Franky's tone became a little more subdued as he added, “I've also been doing this professor thing for pretty long time.”

 

Something about it made Usopp's stomach do a little flip.

 

“Which means, I've been watching students freak out over test grades and projects for a while now. And while I maybe can't tell what’s going on with you like I can when I look at this,”—he gave the engine a small tap—“but I can tell something’s going on.”

 

Usopp couldn’t look Franky directly in the eye. 

 

He actually did want to tell him. That’d be really nice, actually. It’d be nice to break down and sob and tell Franky that he and his best friend had gotten themselves in a lot of fucking hot water, and he needed help really, really badly, because he couldn’t solve this problem just like he couldn’t fix the engine, but maybe if he had some help or something—

 

He couldn’t do that, though. But it’d be nice. 

 

Franky was one of those teachers that actually gave a shit. And Usopp hadn’t known many teachers who were like that. Usopp hadn’t had many adults in his life like that at all. 

 

He wasn’t going to cry, but it’d be nice. 

 

“Usopp,” Franky said, and Usopp finally looked up at him, pulling himself together enough to hold a straight face as Franky continued, “it’s okay to, you know, show emotions. Men are allowed to cry, too. There’s nothing wrong with it.” 

 

“I have to—“ Usopp looked around wildly, and then back at his engine, and he stood up suddenly, “I have to, uh, I forgot that I—I have to go. To the Su—to my house. Uh. Sorry.” 

 

And he shoved what tools were his in his bag, and he didn’t look at Franky, and he was goddamn grateful when Franky didn’t do anything to stop him from bailing out of the lab, out of the room, and once he was through the door and around the corner, he started running. 

 

He ran the entire way to the parking lot, straight to his car, and he got inside it and locked all the doors, and he covered his face with his hands and shouted a bunch of nothing into his palms—random curse words, mostly—and he sat there in his car in the parking lot for a while, he didn’t even know how long, because he didn’t know where the hell else he was going to go at that point. 

 

 

* * *

 

 

_where are you?_

 

It was one thing that Nami hadn’t seen Sanji for a while—that wasn’t that unordinary. With the hours he worked, on top of taking several classes, he wasn’t the easiest guy to spend a lot of time with. The whole super-aloof thing didn’t help, either. But he always responded to her texts. 

 

She sent another after a few minutes. 

 

_i haven’t seen you in 84 years_

 

It’d actually been about a week since she’d seen him, and even then, it was brief. He was in and out of the house in half an hour, gone for another long stretch of time. 

 

Being that Nami often got off work around two in the morning, she used to run into Sanji regularly in the middle of the night when he was still trying to wind down from an all-day shift with a bottle of wine and twenty thousand cigarettes. 

 

The house didn’t even smell like burnt tobacco anymore. 

 

Nami laid in her bed on her back and stared at the ceiling, her phone resting on her chest. It didn’t vibrate, even after, like, fifteen minutes. She sighed and typed his name into her contacts list and actually called him—she hardly called anybody ever. She let people call her instead. 

 

Sanji would know that if Nami was actually bothering to call him, he should fucking pick up the phone. 

 

Oh, except, his phone was turned off. Awesome. Great. 

 

Nami had concerned herself over finding him that night and talking to him—like, she’d made it into some kind of goal—for a few reasons. For one, he was acting weird, and totally unlike himself, and every time she _did_ see him ever since New Years Day, he looked like a zombie. And she had noticed.

 

Sanji could be kind of ridiculous sometimes. Only because he bent over backwards for her, would do anything she asked without hesitation, and… well, Nami knew he wasn’t trying to sleep with her. Because she saw the girls he slept with once in a while. And she only ever saw them once. And Sanji kept coming back to her. 

 

And Nami wasn’t necessarily used to that, coming from someone like him. She didn’t know why he went through such great lengths for her, above everyone else.

 

And there weren’t many people bending over backwards for Sanji. Everyone was too distracted by him to actually be concerned over him. 

 

So there was that. 

 

And for two… well, lately, she’d been going through some intense shit, and she was putting Usopp through some intense shit, and fuck, she wanted to think about something else. She wanted to distract herself with figuring out what the hell was going on with Sanji. 

 

If she couldn’t do much else, maybe she could do something for him, at least. 

 

She didn’t really know what to do now, though. Usopp was passed out. Well, the entire house was asleep. It was past midnight, and with school back in full swing with a new set of classes, everyone was fairly exhausted. Luffy was gone again. But that was different from Sanji being gone. 

 

Nami rolled over and messed around on her phone, hardly even looking at it, her mind wandering. 

 

Maybe she should just go to sleep. Sanji was an adult. He could take care of himself. 

 

With a sigh, she rolled out of bed and went to flip off her bedroom light. Collapsing back on her mattress, she looked at her phone again. Sliding an arm under her pillow, she decided to try one more time. 

 

His phone actually rang this time. It was turned on again. She held her breath without meaning to. 

 

It normally didn’t ring this much. He usually answered right away when she actually called. 

 

Nami waited with the phone pressed hard against her ear. 

 

Finally, on the other line, she heard him pick up and say, “You never bother actually _calling_ me, are you alright?” 

 

“Sanji, are you okay?” 

 

“Me? Yeah? I’m fine?” 

 

Nami rolled over onto her back and stared up into the dark. “You haven’t come to class all week.” 

 

There was silence on the other end for a few seconds. 

 

Nami went on to say, “If something’s wrong, you can tell me, you know. We _are_ friends and all.” 

 

“Nothing’s wrong—“ a deep breath, “—work’s just been stressful. Nothing for you to worry about.”

 

“Are you drunk right now?” Nami asked, like it was any of her business. But Sanji was too nice to her to get angry with how invasive she was being. Well, he might get angry, but he wouldn’t retaliate. 

 

“Uh, I don’t—I’m not—“ 

 

“Were you going to come home tonight?” Nami interrupted him just because she didn’t need to hear him talk much more. His voice always gave him away. He was bad at hiding things like that. 

 

“No.” 

 

Nami paused, and she didn’t know why her heart kind of fell. 

 

He said nothing else. 

 

“Are you sure you’re alright?” Nami asked, trying to put as much concern into her voice as she could fit through the phone. 

 

“Yes. Yes, I’m definitely okay. But thank you.” 

 

Sanji and sincere gratitude without a bunch of undiluted praise and admiration was a rare combination. 

 

“Okay,” Nami said, because she didn’t know what the fuck else to say. “I guess—I’ll let you go. But. You can come home if you want to, Sanji. Everyone’s asleep. I’m the only one still awake.”

 

“I’ll keep that in mind. Thanks, Nami.” 

 

There were a couple seconds of silence between them before he hung up. 

 

Fuck. 

 

Nami rolled over and buried her face in her pillow. Why the hell did he have to be so fucking… _frustrating?_ Why was he trying so hard to keep everything to himself?

 

Then Nami remembered the secret she and Usopp were hiding, and she almost laughed over how hypocritical she was being. 

 

God. 

 

After about ten minutes, just as she was about to fall asleep, her phone rang, and her eyes snapped open. She squinted at the screen for a second and then swiped her thumb across it, answering the call. 

 

“Yeah?” 

 

“Hey, Nami,” Sanji said on the other line, his voice a little uneven, “Actually, yeah, can you come pick me up? Can you come get me? I’m sorry. I’m really sorry.” 

 

“Yeah, are you okay?” Nami said, sitting up immediately, throwing back her blankets and sliding out of bed. 

 

“I’m okay.” 

 

“Alright. Where are you?” Nami asked, slipping into some sweatpants. 

 

“Um… Hold on—“ 

 

Nami kept the phone pressed against her ear while she pulled on her fuzzy house slippers. She was just going to pick him up—she didn’t need to look cute. 

 

“I’m at 14th and Washington. I’m outside a bar called, uh…” another pause, “Spiders Café. Wow, _wow_ , what an awful name for a bar. Have you ever been here?” 

 

“Actually, yeah, I have. I know where you are. I’ll be there in ten minutes. Don’t go anywhere,” Nami said, and before Sanji could start thanking her and apologizing again, she hung up. 

 

She slipped into Usopp’s room and grabbed his keys off his dresser—she didn’t want to wake him up because he’d been sleeping even less than she had, and he would totally understand why she stole his car to go get Sanji when she explained in the morning. 

 

Nami closed Usopp’s bedroom door gently and grabbed her coat and rushed out the door. 

 

She didn’t know why she felt like she needed to hurry. 

 

She slid into Usopp’s car and turned it on and threw it into reverse. 

 

Sanji never asked anyone for anything. 

 

Nami pursed her lips together and shifted into first gear. 

 

Maybe she was worried. She hadn’t been _surprised_ when Sanji had kept his mouth closed when she’d called him the first time. But him calling her back and asking for a favor was _real_ weird. So something felt off. 

 

Something must’ve happened with him. Like, sometime around Christmas. Usopp had brought it up in the beginning, actually—he’d told Nami that he felt like something was up with Sanji, and the more she paid attention, the more she felt like Usopp had been super correct. 

 

It didn’t take her long to get to the bar. And when she pulled up, he was standing out front, leaning hard against the building, smoking a cigarette with his head dipped down. He didn’t look up when she parked the car in neutral. The engine glugged and idled and still, he didn’t look up. She didn’t want to honk the damn horn. 

 

She leaned over to the passenger’s side of the car and hand-cranked the window down. 

 

“Hey, dork!” she shouted, and he looked up at her. It may have been the first time he didn’t smile when he saw her. Instead, he took a deep breath. 

 

Nami jumped out of the car, jogging up to him in her fluffy slippers, and she slid into place next to him as he flicked his cigarette away, and she slipped her arm around his waist and let him lean on her with his arm around her shoulders, and even though she was several inches shorter than him, she provided decent support. 

 

He fell up against the station wagon once they got there, and she opened the door for him, and he leaned on the frame and slid into Usopp’s car without further incident, and he sat there in the seat, hunched over, saying in a voice much too unsteady to really be Sanji, “Thank you so much, fuck, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” 

 

“You’re okay,” Nami said, and she shut the door and walked around the front of the car to the driver’s side. 

 

Once they were driving, she looked over at him periodically. His head was dipped down again, arms folded over his chest, leaned against the window, his face hidden. 

 

After a while, she finally asked, “Are you on drugs? Like, actual drugs?” 

 

He looked up at her and she looked back at the road. 

 

“Please don’t tell anyone else,” he said quietly. 

 

“I won’t.” 

 

Once they got home and Nami parked Usopp’s car in the street in front of the house, Sanji got out and wordlessly stood up, a hand on the open passenger’s side door, balancing himself. 

 

Nami stored Usopp’s keys in her coat pocket and locked the doors and walked around the front of the car. 

 

Sanji looked at her, frowning. What the hell. She hated seeing his face like that. 

 

“Come on,” she said, taking a step towards him. 

 

He didn’t move. 

 

“What’s wrong?” she asked, hesitating at his stony face. 

 

After a short pause, the street feeling deathly quiet in the middle of the frigid night, he said, “I’m fucking _embarrassed._ ”

 

She hadn’t ever heard his voice with that harsh of a tone directed at her.

 

“Nobody’s going to know but me.” 

 

Nami helped a wobbly Sanji inside, and they made their way through the dark, not bothering with the lights because both of them had stumbled down this path plenty of times before, and once they got to the stairs, Sanji exhaled a bit of a laugh. 

 

“You got this,” Nami said, and he grabbed the railing. 

 

“Yep.” 

 

Nami didn’t know why Sanji’s equilibrium was _so off_ when he was clearly fairly coherent, but Nami didn’t know a whole hell of a lot about drugs and shit like that in general. She’d smoked weed with him and Usopp enough times, but she’d kind of assumed that was all any of them ever did. 

 

Between leaning on the railing and using Nami to balance, they made it up the stairs well enough, and Sanji’s hand dragged along the hallway wall as they walked to his bedroom. 

 

He stopped at his doorway and looked down at Nami.

 

“I’m really sorry. Again.” 

 

“Save it,” she said, and she flipped on the lights and pushed him into his room and towards his bed. 

 

Lacking his usual weird grace, he lurched forward, throwing his hands down flat against his mattress to catch himself. Nami laughed a little. 

 

“Now that I know you’re not dying,” Nami said, stepping into his room and shutting the door behind her, “it’s a little funny to see you like this.” 

 

“Nicest friend I have,” Sanji muttered, giving up and just falling face-first into his mattress, laying there motionless. “Talking is very difficult right now.” 

 

“You’re talking well enough,” Nami said, plopping down on his bed, bouncing a little, her legs hanging off the side. 

 

“I’m trying really hard. Why are you still here?” His voice was muffled by his blankets. 

 

“I’unno, I can’t sleep yet,” she replied. 

 

Nami wasn’t going to straight up say to him that she was actually pretty goddamn worried about him, and she wasn’t going to leave him alone when he was clearly so fucked up. 

 

She knew he was trying to hold his shit together in front of her. She could feel the strain on his end. It was hard to explain, but with the way his pupils were so huge and he was so pale and his speech was so slow and laggy and just… Nami could tell. And he was being so… real with her. 

 

Sanji always put on his best face for her. And right now, his face was shoved into his comforter. 

 

“I wish you would leave,” Sanji said quietly, and after a few seconds and a deep breath, “Sorry.”

 

“I’m not going to.” 

 

When Sanji said nothing else, Nami moved beside him and pushed hard, forcing him to roll onto his back, and he groaned in wordless protest. 

 

“I can ride this out,” he said to the ceiling. “Go to bed.” 

 

“I’m good right here,” Nami said, and she crawled over his mattress to take a seat right above him with her legs crossed, scooting forward inch by inch. She gathered up all his blond hair and slipped her hands under his head, which was like total dead weight, and she maneuvered his head into her lap, and he looked up at her with huge dark eyes. She smiled down at him, leaning over him. “Relax.” 

 

“I love you so much,” he said, and he smiled for the first time that night, and she grinned back. 

 

“I know you do,” she replied, and she pulled all the hair away from his face, running her fingers through it over and over, almost rhythmically, and he sighed. 

 

“Are you going to tell me what happened?” she asked, looking over at his desk and all the books stacked on it. 

 

“Nothing happened.” 

 

She said nothing in response, but she kept pulling his hair away from his face. 

 

“Why are you so fucked up?” Nami asked, looking down at him again. 

 

“Right now or in general?” 

 

Nami snorted and patted his cheek. “Right now.” 

 

“I messed up.” 

 

Nami didn’t even know what that was supposed to mean. 

 

“But,” Sanji said, and he held up his hands, spreading his fingers, half-focused eyes on his palms, “I feel like I’m fucking tripping. I thought maybe I was going to puke, but I think I’m okay now. I mean. I’m… I don’t think I’m going to throw up.” 

 

“Good to hear.” Nami watched his face as he turned his hands over, looking at the backs of them before dropping them to his chest. 

 

“I feel like, uh, like my brain isn’t connected to my body.”

 

“That’s nice—Sanji, did you take mystery drugs from strangers?” 

 

He exhaled loudly like a child being scolded. “Yes.” 

 

Even though their back-and-forth sounded half-joking for a second, Nami was being damn serious, and she knew that he knew it. 

 

“Don’t fucking do that ever again,” she said, her tone much less gentle now. 

 

“I thought it was one thing but it was not that thing,” Sanji mumbled, his eyes closing while she kept running her fingers through his hair. “It was some, uh… you know, nondescript white powder bullshit kind of thing.” 

 

She said nothing to his confession. 

 

They were quiet for a minute while Nami chewed on her lip, thinking to herself while Sanji maybe faded in and out, she could hardly tell, his breathing was so slow.

 

“Please stop doing this,” she said finally, her voice just above a whisper. “Everyone’s worried about you.” 

 

He didn’t say anything. 

 

“Chopper’s going to try to examine you, for god’s sake, once he notices. It’s not like he hasn’t picked up on the fact that you never show up to class. And Usopp—Usopp was the one who noticed something was wrong with you in the first place. He cares about you, Sanji.” Nami didn’t know if she was talking to herself at this point, but she kept on anyway.“And Luffy, once Luffy gets back, he’s going to flip out if you aren’t around. And even Zoro—“ 

 

“Fuck Zoro.” 

 

Nami stopped talking and looked down at him, momentarily pausing with her fingers half-buried in his hair. 

 

He opened his eyes just a little, but he didn’t look at her. “I know he’s your friend, but I don’t give a flying fuck about Zoro.” 

 

“He was your friend too, not long ago,” Nami said. 

 

“Zoro was never my _friend._ ” 

 

Nami didn’t know how to respond. 

 

“I’m sorry. Nami, I—you’re being especially nice and I’m fucking sorry. Talk about something pleasant. Um. Tell me about, uh… tell me about your mother.” 

 

“My mom?” Nami asked, raising her eyebrows. 

 

“Yeah. Tell me about her and your sister.” 

 

Nami looked down at him and his eyes were closed again. She sighed a little. 

 

“My mom was the most badass lady on the planet,” she began, and he smiled a little. “And my sister is too.” 

 

Nami threaded her fingers through Sanji’s hair, resuming her repetitions of pulling it back and smoothing it down as she talked about her family. He didn’t say much, but he would hum sometimes to let her know he was listening. She mentioned that her mother smoked as much as Sanji did and was in way better shape than he was, and he grinned. 

 

She didn’t tell him about the very serious trouble she and her sister and consequently Usopp were all in. She didn’t mention any of that, tried not to think about it, tried to pretend it wasn’t real just for that night. Instead, she focused on her childhood. She focused on Sanji because he fucking needed it. 

 

She told him the stories from some of her favorite memories, and eventually, after a while, she leaned over him and whispered, “Are you still awake?” 

 

He was motionless except for the steady rise and fall of his chest, all his hair pulled back and splayed over her lap, with his hands resting on his stomach. He was still wearing his jacket and everything. Even his shoes. His feet hung off the edge of the bed. 

 

He didn’t answer her question. 

 

As gently as she could, she slid out from underneath him, and he shifted and yawned and rolled onto his stomach, reaching forward blindly for a pillow. She passed one to him, and he stuffed his face into it. 

 

His long yawns were always contagious, and Nami stretched and ended up just laying back, because his bed was bigger than even Usopp’s, and there was plenty of room, and she’d get up in a minute, but eventually, without really meaning to, she fell asleep right next to him. 

 

In the morning, she was decently confused when she woke up. 

 

Nami sat up in a foreign bed and looked around a room that wasn’t hers, forgetting for a moment where she was. And then she remembered Sanji and everything that’d happened the previous night, and she frowned at the empty bedroom. 

 

She laid back down for a few minutes because what the _hell_ , Sanji’s bed was maybe more comfortable than hers was. 

 

Twenty minutes later, or maybe an hour later, Nami didn’t even know, she made her way down the stairs and paused when she glanced to her left. She smelled it before she saw it. The kitchen counter/bar was loaded with tons of food. 

 

Walking up to the buffet, it looked like Sanji had made every single breakfast dish she had ever mentioned was especially good. The smell was almost overwhelming, and it made her mouth water. Nami swallowed and grinned. 

 

She smelled burnt tobacco and looked over her shoulder. Padding up to the couch, she leaned over the back of it to find Sanji laying there, totally passed out, still in his clothes from the previous night, with a few smashed cigarette butts in the ash tray on the coffee table next to him. 

 

She smiled. 

 

* * *

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks as always for reading and for reviewing and reblogging and all the things! god we appreciate it. such FUEL. alright
> 
> so things are getting kind of exciting, which we wanted to do because one piece is nuts and exciting and all over the place, and we hope you like the direction things are going in bc they aren't slowing down anytime soon~


	9. February

Sanji finally opened his eyes. 

 

Fuck.

 

Every single day, for as many years as he could remember in detail, the same thing dragged him from his bed each morning. 

 

It was still dark in his room as he walked to his desk and felt and pushed around books and other random objects until he found his pack of cigarettes. _Thankfully_ he’d thought of his future self last night, and he’d saved himself a couple to smoke in the morning so that he wouldn’t have to immediately brave the cold when he woke up. Walking half a mile to the gas station against bitter February wind wasn’t part of his ideal morning routine.

 

He hadn’t been thinking of his future self very much as of late. So this was a good start. This was progress. 

 

Fuck, it was already February. 

 

Sanji poked his head out of his bedroom doorway and into the hall, looking down it in both directions before lighting his cigarette and stepping out, closing his door behind him. 

 

He didn’t know why he was bothering—it was too early for anyone else to be awake anyway. Except maybe Usopp. But that was fine. He was fine, anyway.  

 

Sanji walked down the winding stairs as quietly as he could, a giant hoodie that he’d taken to wearing around the colder-than-comfortable house blanketed around him, and he skipped the second-to-last step because it creaked like the whole damn staircase was about to collapse. 

 

He sat on the kitchen counter with his legs folded, and he smoked his cigarette as slowly as he could, stretching it out while a pot of strong coffee brewed beside him, ash tray in his lap.

 

He thought, for a moment, about all the homework he still needed to do. That he wasn’t going to do. 

 

After rubbing his eyes and stubbing out his cigarette, he pulled his phone from his pocket and scrolled through news feeds without really reading much of anything. 

 

It felt weird, sitting there, scrolling aimlessly while the coffee pot slowly filled next to him. He used to do this almost every single morning. But it’d been a while. 

 

He itched for something else to smoke—something to do with his mouth and his hands—but held out on himself because he only had one cigarette left and he had to save it until he was desperate because it was too fucking cold outside and he couldn’t deal with it. 

 

And he wasn’t desperate just yet.

 

Sanji set his ash tray to the side, and he pulled his knees to his chest and let his chin rest on his kneecap. 

 

Honestly, there was only one reason why he was even at the Sunny at the moment. 

 

Chewing idly on his chapped lips, Sanji stared off across the room with unfocused eyes, sifting through his memories of the past month, which, at that point, more or less bled together. 

 

He was perfectly aware of what probably everyone—except Chopper and Luffy, maybe?—thought he’d been doing for the past several weeks. 

 

He _tried_ , but his success rate was kind of shitty most of the time. Unfortunately for Sanji, he wasn’t as good at convincing people to sleep with him as, say, maybe _Zoro_ would believe. 

 

He started to clench his jaw and grit his teeth together, but he stopped himself almost immediately before he gave himself a headache. 

 

He had considerable experience in dealing with this weird reflex-reaction by now.

 

It wasn’t fucking like he’d been thinking about a whole lot _else_ for the past month. Months. Several months, possibly. God fucking damn it. 

 

It felt weird to be sitting in the kitchen— _his_ fucking kitchen—doing the thing he used to consider routine. He’d been making coffee in other people's kitchens lately. As much as he could, anyway. 

 

He had a very long list of names in his phone’s address book. 

 

It was funny and a little sad, in the end, how many college kids would entertain him and let him crash at their place in exchange for a home-cooked meal. 

 

And he was starting to exhaust that list. 

 

Sanji listened to the coffee brewing next to him, and he inhaled the scent as much as he could, because he loved the smell of coffee because it was something he could _actually smell_ , and he pressed his face into his kneecaps. 

 

Who was he kidding. He was getting fucking desperate. 

 

He didn’t want them to see him like this. 

 

The only reason he was at the Sunny at the moment, showing his face and making the place reek of his cigarettes, was Nami. 

 

More than Nami, even. It was all of them. 

 

“Sanji!” 

 

“Hm?” Sanji’s head snapped up at the sound of her voice. He hadn’t even heard her coming down the stairs. Maybe she also knew about the second-to-last step.

 

“Good morning,” she smiled, and she looked tired as hell, and he smiled back at her. 

 

“Morning,” he replied, his voice sounding all croaky and hoarse. He slid from his spot on the counter and stretched. “Want something to eat?” 

 

“Oh, nah, it’s too early to eat still. Coffee, though.” 

 

Nami sat on one of the stools at the counter/bar, leaning on it hard and yawning. 

 

“Yeah, why are you awake?” Sanji asked over his shoulder as he poured her a cup. 

 

“Usopp and I both have an early class today. Which you’d probably _know_ if you were ever here anymore.” 

 

He turned and walked a steaming cup of coffee over to her, frowning at it rather than her. 

 

“I’ve been here.” 

 

“Hardly. The past two days barely count.” 

 

But they were a very long and stressful two days. He’d spent those two days mostly holed up in his bedroom. But they still counted. 

 

“Anyway, why are _you_ awake so early?” she asked, acting like she was changing the subject, but, damn it, he knew she really wasn’t. “I feel like this is earlier than normal for you.”

 

The answer to her question was easy: He hadn’t been sleeping much. He was always up this early these days. He needed a bottle of wine to pass out at night most of the time. He was losing control over his life. Had already lost it. Like, a _while_ ago.

 

“I messed up my sleep schedule.” It wasn’t really a lie.

 

“Well fix it. And come to class more. You even _like_ our Non-Western Civ teacher, I don’t know why you never show up. You’re the one who said we should take her class in the first place.” 

 

She was right. He’d suggested to Chopper and Nami that they knock out their history elective together with Professor Nico Robin’s class, because she was gorgeous and perfect and one of Sanji’s favorite teacher-crushes out of all the Sabaody professors. And to be fair, Sanji usually wound up daydreaming about pretty much all of his professors under the age of fifty during their classes rather than paying close attention. 

 

But he’d made this suggestion to them back in December—early December. And now... Now, he didn’t really care about how attractive Robin was. 

 

He actually _wanted_ to care about how smart and cool and beautiful she was, and he literally could not. 

 

Sure as hell he didn’t care about the fucking class itself. 

 

He didn’t care a whole lot about anything anymore. 

 

“Either way. I still don’t know exactly what’s bothering you so much,” Nami went on when he forgot to say anything for a few seconds, and his eyes found hers as she continued, “but you should man up and stop running away like a giant baby.” 

 

“I’m not _running away_.” 

 

That one was a lie. 

 

“So what would you call it, then?” 

 

He didn’t have a response for her. 

 

He could hear Usopp trouncing down the stairs with his loud yawning, and he knew Nami heard him too.

 

“How would you define dropping off the face of the planet and sleeping god-knows-where every night?” 

 

Sanji’s eyes got a little wider, and his eyebrows furrowed just a bit, and he felt his mouth tighten and his lips press together.

 

She lowered her voice just slightly.

 

“What would you call doing drugs with people you don’t even _know_ in shitty bars in the middle of the night?” 

 

He felt like he was sinking into the floor, and he put a single index finger in front of his mouth, jaw clenched so hard, tapping his lips with his finger, silently _begging her._

 

“Chill,” she said, her voice a whisper now, and she leaned forward a little further over the counter/bar. “But I’m serious. Stop. You’re stronger than this, Sanji.” 

 

He couldn’t say anything to the expression on her face. Nobody ever really looked at him like that.

 

Sanji turned away from her and went to fill a mug for Usopp as he came down the stairs, stretching and groaning. 

 

Wordlessly, Sanji handed Usopp his coffee, and he lit a cigarette and watched Usopp take the cup and climb onto a stool next to Nami and kind of sit there half-collapsed over the counter/bar while he sipped at his drink with his eyes still mostly closed. 

 

He and Usopp used to have this exchange pretty regularly during the nights that Sanji was still awake after a long shift at Mariejois, when Usopp had to wake up at the break of dawn to work at the coffee shop. 

 

Sanji took a drag of his cigarette.

 

He’d missed this. 

 

Whatever this was. This whole routine, sitting with the both of them, with everyone who lived there, smoking cigarettes and drinking too much coffee just to get through the day, and feeling _normal_ and like he was _home_. He didn’t know how to define it. He hadn’t really experienced it before.

 

“Hey,” Usopp said, still groggy as hell, and Sanji leaned back against the far counter and reached for his ash tray. 

 

Neither Sanji or Nami said anything, waiting for Usopp to finish his slow train of thought. 

 

“Sanji.” 

 

“Me.” 

 

“Yeah. Uh,” Usopp rubbed his face, trying to sit up straighter. “You know what, there’s uh... this weekend, you should come with us to Zoro’s match.” 

 

“What?” Sanji inhaled a very long drag of his cigarette, glancing at Nami for a second, who was just watching him. 

 

“His match. You should come with us. Me and Nami and everyone, all of us are going to watch.” 

 

“His match? Like fencing?” 

 

“No. Boxing.” 

 

“What the fuck, since when does that dipshit _box_?” 

 

Usopp took a good few gulps of his coffee now that it was cooled down enough to start chugging it. “Since he got kicked off the fencing team.” 

 

“He got kicked off?” 

 

Nami nodded and filled in, “Yeah, two or three weeks ago, apparently.”

 

“ _Why?_ ” 

 

“He told me it was because his grades were too shitty. He lost his scholarship and everything,” she replied. 

 

“What the fuck, he did so well on his exams?” 

 

Sanji didn’t know why he was suddenly so _frustrated._

 

“Yeah, well,” Nami said, leaning on her elbow and resting her chin on her hand, “it wasn’t enough, I guess.” 

 

“So he just...” Sanji trailed off, frowning at his ash tray. 

 

He heard Nami mumble, “Dunno why you _care_ —“ but Usopp talked over her and seemingly didn’t register a word she’d said. Which Sanji was very grateful for. 

 

“Right, so he just decided to pick up boxing like the next day seemingly.”

 

“What the fuck.”

 

“I know. I guess he bounces back pretty damn quick?” Usopp said absently.

 

Sanji glanced at Nami one more time, and he wasn’t really surprised to find her staring him down over what Usopp had just said. 

 

“I guess he fucking does,” Sanji said after a few seconds.

 

“Yeah, funny, right? Luffy taught him. Or, uh, as much as he could in a couple weeks, I think.” 

 

“Luffy boxes?” Sanji asked, trying to digest all this information at once and keep a straight face over it. 

 

“Yes. Anyway,” Nami cut in, much more assertive than Usopp’s half-awake rambling, “the point is, we’re all going to watch Zoro’s very first boxing match ever this weekend, and you should _definitely_ go with us.” 

 

They were both looking right at him. 

 

He took a drag of his cigarette. 

 

“Nah.” 

 

“Come _on,_ ” Usopp groaned, leaning a little on Nami as his posture worsened. It was funny how he got more confident when he was tired, and when she was around. “You haven’t done anything with us in _so long, come on—“_

 

“I’m having coffee with you right now, shut up.” 

 

“Yeah but we’re _all_ going to this. It’ll be fun,” Nami said, ganging up on him with Usopp like Sanji knew she would. 

 

“Watching sports in general is not _fun_ , you both _know this—_ “ 

 

“Ah,” Usopp interrupted him, “but you could potentially see Zoro get rocked in the face.”

 

Sanji paused. 

 

“He only just started boxing. I mean, he’s probably going to get punched in the face.” 

 

Usopp... had an interesting point. 

 

They were both looking at him so expectantly. Fuck, they knew him so well by now. 

 

“... You guys—“ 

 

“Right in the face.” 

 

Sanji chewed on his lip. Goddamn it.

 

“I really _don’t want_ to go.” 

 

“Sanji,” Nami said, and his eyes snapped to hers.

 

He realized he was holding his breath. 

 

She puckered her eyebrows and her lips just a little, and she _pouted_ at him with the saddest giant brown eyes and puffy cheeks and, fuck, he was about to smack himself into another dimension because she knew _exactly what she was doing_ as she said, “ _Please_ go with us. Please?” 

 

Sanji stubbed his cigarette out in his ash tray and almost threw it onto the counter beside him. 

 

“Right in the _face_ ,” Usopp whispered.

 

Sanji glared at them. Mostly at Usopp. But they were both sitting there on the other side of the counter/bar, leaning over it together at him, both of them looking so fucking _hopeful_ , like they really actually honestly.... cared.

 

He sighed.

 

“Fine.” 

 

They actually cheered.

 

It was too fucking early for this shit. Sanji groaned internally and loudly. 

 

“Good, this’ll be lots of fun,” Nami grinned. 

 

“Yeah,” Sanji said, and he shot Usopp a pointed look. “If nobody hits him, I’m going to punch _you_ in the face.” 

 

Usopp looked considerably less happy than he’d been a couple seconds ago. 

 

“You wouldn’t.” 

 

“Wouldn’t I?” 

 

Sanji gave Usopp a look that said, ‘ _try me, asshole, you should_ know _by now that I’ll fucking do it,_ ’ and he was confident that his message had been effectively communicated because Usopp had gotten pretty damn good at reading his facial expressions over the several months that they’d known each other, and also because he shut the hell up. 

 

Nami more or less ignored them in favor of turning her attention to her phone, probably wholly unconcerned over who punched who, really. 

 

“So anyway, you two have fun in school,” Sanji said, pushing himself up and away from where he’d been leaning against the counter. 

 

“Are you going somewhere?” Nami asked, raising her eyebrows a little. 

 

“Just to the gas station. I’m out of cigarettes.” 

 

“If you wait a few minutes, I’ll drive you real quick before we go to class,” Usopp said in between a few long gulps of his coffee. 

 

Sanji had literally just threatened to punch Usopp in his face not one minute ago, and now Usopp was fucking offering him a ride to the goddamn gas station. 

 

It was weird—for a few seconds, Sanji found that he couldn’t really speak. It took him a moment to find his voice.

 

“Uh. That would be very nice of you.” 

 

It was so simple and stupid. But it was shit like that. And the coffee, and the feeling normal, feeling at home—feeling like they really _did_ want him to go to Zoro’s dumbass boxing match—like they actually really fucking wanted him around. 

 

“Sure thing. What’re friends for,” Usopp mumbled into his mug, finishing off what was left of his drink. 

 

Fuck. 

 

Sanji supposed that was what it was. That thing he couldn’t really define, that he’d never really ever had or experienced before in his life. 

 

The word ‘friend’ was one he used liberally. But maybe he should stop doing that. Because most of the people he knew didn’t actually deserve the word, now that he was starting to understand what the hell it meant, and how important the whole thing was to him. 

 

“Thanks,” Sanji said, slipping his hands in his hoodie pocket and wringing them together. 

 

“Anytime.” 

 

He finally noticed Nami smiling at him while Usopp slid off his stool and started stretching again. 

 

Usopp and Nami went and located their heavy coats and all the shit they’d need for their classes while Sanji filled two thermoses for them to take. 

 

The trip to the gas station took infinitely less time with Usopp driving, and when they pulled back up to the Sunny again to drop him off, Usopp turned in his seat and grinned at Sanji. 

 

“I’m glad you’re kind of around more lately. The house doesn’t smell right without the cigarettes.” 

 

Sanji almost slapped him. 

 

“Don’t say shit like that, fucking idiot,” Sanji mumbled, reaching for the door handle. 

 

“Looking forward to this weekend!” Nami added, reaching over the seat to pat his cheek before he could escape. 

 

“Uh-huh,” Sanji said, and he nearly leapt and rolled out of Usopp’s car and slammed the door shut before he started doing something stupid like telling them _both_ how much he loved them. 

 

He shivered in the wind and watched them drive off before turning and walking inside, and he went straight to the long couch and threw himself down on it. He kept his coat zipped up around himself, and he shifted and dug for his cigarettes, zoning out while he packed them as he laid flat on his back. 

 

Usopp would never really know what it meant to Sanji when he said shit like the house didn’t _smell right_ _without his cigarettes._  

 

For most of his life, Sanji often equated people's views on spending time with him, and him in general, to the way they reacted to his smoking habit: intrusive, gross, _annoying_ , stupid and thoughtless, keep at least twelve feet away from all building entrances, it was kind of _pathetic_ , please keep away, please go _somewhere else_ , my clothes and my hair will stink, I don’t want to breathe that shit—

 

With a deep breath, Sanji lit the first cigarette from his new pack and stared up at the raised ceiling above him with the lights that hung just out of reach. 

 

The thing was, all the shit that people thought about smoking, and all the shit they said about cigarettes and the smell and habit, were ultimately fair and completely true. So.

 

So the thought of Usopp not minding the way cigarettes smelled—and Sanji couldn’t even _smell it_ , he didn’t even know, and he didn’t douse himself in cologne because he _wanted_ to be tacky, after fucking all—the thought of Usopp wanting that smell around the house where they all lived almost choked him up a little. 

 

For the first time in a very, _very_ long time, Sanji replayed positive things people had said about him in his head while he stared off into space. Mostly what Usopp and Nami had said to him very recently. But Luffy and Chopper, too, had certainly said some kind things about him in the past, and he hung onto that for almost an entire minute before he lost it again. 

 

_You’re the most fake mother fucker I’ve ever—_

 

Ah, there it was. Despite how much he wanted to focus on Nami, and Chopper and Usopp and Luffy, and the friendships he’d apparently cultivated somehow that he certainly didn’t deserve—despite wanting that very much, the constant loop that echoed in his head was Zoro. 

 

_You treat people like objects._

 

Sanji chewed on his lip, rolling his cigarette back and forth between his index finger and his thumb. 

 

_And you probably hate yourself so much that the real reason you break your back is that you’re trying to get people to like you._

 

Fucking asshole. 

 

_And you just end up using them for your own selfish shit in the end._

 

Sanji really did hate Zoro. He honestly did. 

 

_Because you’re so fucking lonely and vindictive._

 

Because everything he said was fucking true. 

 

It was kind of ridiculous, the way Sanji could be so bitter towards people, and yet, fuck, still crave their approval and their attention so badly. 

 

He’d always fucking been a bitter goddamn asshole. Ever since he was a kid and regularly snapped at people for making fun of the way he spoke, and his hair, and just everything, he’d been bitter. After the first fight he’d been in as a child that resulted in him getting his ass handed to him, he’d been quick to blow up at almost anyone that crossed him. Because even if he got his ass kicked, lashing out felt so much _better._

 

Because. Fuck, because the whole time, in the end, he really _had_ wanted to make friends. 

 

He wanted what all the other snotty idiot cocksucking shit-kicking American kids had. He wanted to run around with all the other asshole little boys and tease girls and laugh with everyone, and all that shit, but he just didn’t... fucking fit in. And that was all it fucking was. Some people just didn’t fit in, there was no goddamn way around it. And every time he came home with a black eye or a broken nose, Zeff would mention something about how he should make friends, like it was _so fucking easy._

 

And then he’d grown up a little and gotten lucky—really, literally, the loss of his virginity could’ve only been attributed to luck—and then it was over, and he did _not_ hate that person the way he wound up hating people most of the time. And sex changed a lot of things for him. 

 

Finally, he found a way to feel _close_ to someone. To people. 

 

He stopped trying, stopped _wanting_ to make friends. Instead, he tried to sleep with people. It was so much better that way—he could feel that connection, feel like he was experiencing something with someone, and it didn’t result in him wanting to jump off a cliff. And he could continue on with his stupid life and focus on the things he actually cared about, things that _always_ made him feel good, like cooking. 

 

It was natural that he didn’t form a lasting connection with anyone. It made sense that he moved on immediately and started looking for someone new. Because even though he couldn’t get around wanting to be close to people, the fact remained that he _certainly_ wasn’t going to trust them. That much he could control.

 

Until recently, anyway. 

 

The tenants at the Thousand Sunny changed that for him. Probably starting last August. 

 

Before moving into the Sunny, Sanji didn’t trust people as a rule because, ultimately, _always_ , there was going to be rejection. He was always going to wind up feeling hurt, or angry, or simply fucking stupid. If not immediately, then eventually. So he tried to just sleep with people. And he was successful sometimes. And it was great. Not so long ago, he’d considered the feeling to be something like love. 

 

And if he was rejected, then what the fuck ever, he hardly knew that person. 

 

He’d started off with women because, _obviously_ , women were better than men in every single way. Hands down. And men were assholes, and it was always _boys_ responsible for leaving him with bruises and knocking his teeth out. 

 

But, fuck, he liked what he liked when he liked it. 

 

He’d actually initially kept that on the down-low at the Sunny. Honestly, because at first, shit, he _really liked_ everyone at the Sunny, and he didn’t want to give them the opportunity to disappoint him. But it hadn’t taken him very long to figure out that they weren’t those sorts of people. 

 

For the first time ever, Sanji had started to feel close to someone for longer than a night at a time. Multiple someones, even.  

 

And so, the first time Sanji thought about Zoro without any clothes on, it hadn’t been _weird_ because he was used to thinking that about people. Also, he was pretty sure everyone thought about almost everyone naked at some point. But thinking about Zoro—that was a bad idea. 

 

And that was a no-brainer. 

 

He lived with Zoro, he fought with him _constantly_ , Zoro grated on his fucking nerves like he got off on it, and the whole thing screamed _fucking new level of stupid ideas._  

 

The obstacle he couldn’t cross, though, was that, eventually, he _couldn’t_ stop thinking about Zoro. Just in fucking general. Naked, not naked, it didn’t even matter somehow. 

 

And this fact in particular was the thing that was weird. Normally, he could just move the hell on.

 

Shit, he fucking _hated_ Zoro. 

 

Sanji stubbed his cigarette out in the ash tray on the coffee table and immediately lit another. 

 

In the beginning, he’d tried replacing Zoro. With anyone. Which was a complete failure because, even when he managed to sleep with someone else, he kept coming back to Zoro. 

 

Avoidance also failed miserably, again, because he kept _coming back to Zoro._

 

So he tried to just... focus on hating him. And not to think about the other things. He started drinking more.

 

And this was also, regrettably and obviously, a horrible, dismal goddamn failure. 

 

And Sanji hadn’t known... still didn’t know what the fuck to do. 

 

He’d made such stupid, idiotic mistakes. 

 

He took a very long drag of his cigarette, sucking it all deep into his diaphragm and holding it there, trying to just pause everything for even a few fucking seconds—his breath, his thoughts, his heart. 

 

With a loud, smoky exhale from black and polluted lungs, he accepted his failure. 

 

He’d fucked up _so bad._

 

Shit. 

 

He fucking _hated_ himself. 

 

He’d gotten drunk that night at the Christmas party because... for a lot of reasons. And he’d tried to make that connection with Zoro, finally just given in to all the things he’d been trying to stamp out, and he’d fucking approached the situation the only way he goddamn knew how to. He’d thrown himself at Zoro the same way he did with anyone else, because he didn’t know what the fuck he was supposed to do when he actually... 

 

And then, while Sanji had sat there on his ass in a bathtub in a fucking frat restroom, looking awkward and stupid as hell with Zoro yelling at him and glaring at him like the goddamn piece of shit he was, all he could think to himself was _you’re right, you’re fucking right. You’re the only one who would say this shit to me. And you’re right._

 

Sanji sucked in a deep breath and rubbed his eyes. He’d relived that moment over and over again, every motherfucking day since it’d happened. 

 

In that moment, in that stupid bathtub, he’d never felt more alone. And he’d never felt like anyone had ever understood him so well. And he’d never felt so fucking _insecure_ in his entire shitty life. 

 

So of course, he’d only proven how on point Zoro’s words were that night by running to the first person he could think of. And he’d desperately just tried to recreate that connected feeling with someone, anyone else, because surely, if he could just convince himself even for a little while that he was still capable of getting someone to want him, to want to feel close to him, if he could do that _one thing_ , then he’d maybe be alright. 

 

Usopp wouldn’t ever really understand the role he’d played that night for Sanji. But thank god he’d played it anyway. 

 

Of course, ultimately, it was another failure. 

 

He was not alright. 

 

Sanji stubbed out his second cigarette. 

 

It wasn’t enough. 

 

He lit a third. 

 

Nami’s words from earlier chanted in his head. 

 

_You should man up and stop running away._

 

He’d told her that he wasn’t running away, which was fucking hilarious, because at that point, he was willing to go just about anywhere and do just about anything to run from it, to stop thinking about it, and to stop feeling like this. 

 

Yeah. Okay. He was fucking desperate.

 

At that point, if getting high with shitty people who lied to him about what drugs he was snorting off dark tabletops in scummy bars meant that he’d be able to forget about it even for a little while, then absolutely, yes, he would do that. 

 

_Don’t fucking do that ever again._

 

Nami had also said that to him, the night she’d picked him up from that scummy bar. Of course she’d call him out. He could trust her to do that. He could trust her. 

 

_But I’m serious. Stop._

 

He wanted to stop. 

 

_You’re stronger than this, Sanji._

 

He didn’t believe her. But. 

 

She was his friend. And she cared about him. 

 

And Usopp, too. And Luffy, and Chopper. 

 

And they wanted him to go to Zoro’s first ever boxing match. 

 

None of them would ever really know what they’d done for him already. And so, when they’d asked him for this one thing, this thing that seemed simple to them that was _not simple at all_ for Sanji, he’d agreed. He would do anything they asked of him in the end, probably.

 

He hadn’t left the house in two days, other than to work and to go to class, and he’d cooked and left out every meal for them in those two days, and he’d fucking agreed to go to Zoro’s goddamn boxing match. 

 

Because they were his friends. 

 

The weekend snuck up on him, and he didn’t even realize it was the day of Zoro’s match until Nami mentioned it about an hour before they were supposed to leave. 

 

_Fuck._

 

He’d thought about it ten thousand times a day, and still, fucking _somehow_ —he’d had a hard time keeping track of time lately, but this was goddamn ridiculous.

 

When Nami mentioned it, he’d played it casual, but his mind was racing through a list of excuses he could give her to get out of it. 

 

None of that shit would work, though. It was _Nami_ , who he worshiped and loved and admired and appreciated so much. He was really bad at lying to her. And she was _really good_ at calling out his bullshit. 

 

So he’d gone upstairs to his room and closed his door and paced back and forth with his phone in his hand, though he didn’t even look at it. 

 

He wound up going to the bathroom and locking himself in and turning on the fan and the sink just to create some noise, and he stood and stared down at the toilet because he was very possibly about to vomit. 

 

In the end, he leaned back against the wall and slid down it, crouching with his thighs pressed against his chest, and he smoked two cigarettes and tried to read an article on his phone. Tried to stop thinking about it. Routine. 

 

It worked, kind of. Not really. Time fucking continued to pass regardless, and he had to find something to wear. 

 

God _damn it._

 

When he walked back downstairs with a decent-looking outfit on and his hair relatively in place, trying to not look so fucking ate up and shitty like he’d been modeling for the past month and a half, Nami smiled at him from over on the couch. 

 

“You look good.” 

 

Shit. 

 

He grinned so hard, it almost felt foreign, it’d been so long, and he jammed his hands in his pockets and told her he was going to make her a drink. The smile on his face faded a little once his back was turned, but it stuck around for a minute while he thought about her and the badass cocktail he was about to invent. 

 

“Luffy and Zoro already left on the Vespa—I told them we didn’t wanna hang around waiting forever at some shitty restaurant or bar or wherever the hell this place is—I have the address in my phone—so you and me and Chopper and Usopp are gonna drive up there separately in a little bit.” 

 

“Sounds good,” he said back to her from the kitchen, and he kept his head down while he selected ingredients for four cocktails. 

 

He chewed on the inside of his cheek, wondering if she knew the full breadth of what she did for him. 

 

He thought about Zoro on the back of Luffy’s scooter and almost laughed aloud. 

 

Chopper and Usopp and Nami—the three of them were so damn good at making him smile, and they filled the silence, he hardly had to say anything, and they were all so _loud_ , from the moment they were all collected downstairs and ranting about the cocktails he’d made for each of them, to Usopp’s old station wagon, yelling and complaining about the cold, and the music, and laughing at each other over just about anything. 

 

Those three made the ride to, uh... what the fuck, the _Mermaid Cafe_? What the hell kind of name was that? 

 

Sanji stepped out of the car and made a face at the flickering neon sign.

 

Those three made the ride to the restaurant or bar or whatever much less painful. 

 

He lit a cigarette immediately because he needed something to do with his hands worse than normal, and Nami linked her arm around his like she was prone to doing, and she pulled him along towards the entrance while he tried to smoke the entire thing in a few deep breaths. 

 

He flicked his cigarette away just before he got to the door, and as she pulled him through the threshold, his only thought was, _fuck._  

 

“We’re supposed to go downstairs,” Nami said as she turned to him and Usopp and Chopper, releasing his arm once they were inside. 

 

“What the fuck, is this a goddamn fight club—“

 

“I think so, actually.” 

 

“What the fuck—“

 

“Am I old enough to be here?” Chopper interrupted them, and they all turned to look at him. 

 

Glancing around the restaurant, which was actually closed—the only part open still was the bar—they realized that Chopper did look a bit... a lot younger than everyone else sitting in the wooden stools and leaning on the bar top.  

 

“Well. Do you _feel_ old enough to be here?” Sanji asked. 

 

“Uh, I think so—“

 

Usopp cut in, “Are you _sure?_ ”

 

“Uh... yes?” 

 

Usopp and Sanji both looked at Nami, who folded her arms over her chest, clicking her tongue, like she was debating something. And then she nodded just once. 

 

“Okay. You’re old enough to be here.” 

 

“Oh. Um. Good.” 

 

When they walked down the dark stairway, Nami led them as she explained that she was doing her best to follow the directions Luffy and Zoro had given her, because they all _knew_ how difficult that could be to interpret, but this was the address they’d given her, and they had both definitely told her to go to the basement, so...

 

Apparently she’d done a pretty good job of navigating, because when they got to the bottom of the stairs, they walked up on an actual fucking fight club. Or at least, that was what it felt like, and sounded like, and looked like, from what Sanji could see through the open door. 

 

There was a bouncer. Or a door guy. Or... something. He was big. And he stood at the entrance. 

 

Nami walked right up to him, and the rest of them followed in her wake. 

 

“Is he old enough to be here?” The door guy asked when they approached. 

 

Nami looked over her shoulder at Chopper, who was staring down at the floor. 

 

“Oh, absolutely,” Nami replied, taking another step towards the guy. 

 

“He don’t look old enough to drink. I’m gonna need to see his ID.” 

 

Nami did that little hand motion to signal the guy to lean in a bit closer. And when he did, she said something. Something Sanji couldn’t quite hear over the general noise of the place—lots of people yelling and hitting each other and all that. And when she was done talking, the door guy looked at her, pursed his lips together and pulled his mouth to the side of his face, like he was thinking, and he finally shifted his weight and spoke. 

 

“I don’t—hey, where’d he go—“ 

 

The door guy looked over Nami’s shoulder, right at Sanji and the empty space surrounding him. And then he turned his head and looked through the open entryway. And then back at Nami and Sanji. 

 

Usopp and Chopper were nowhere to be seen. 

 

“Goddamn it.“

 

“You don’t get paid enough for this,” Nami smiled at him, shrugging. 

 

He frowned, rubbed his eyes, mumbled something like, “I don’t even remember his face—whatever. Just go,” and Nami and Sanji walked in together.

 

They’d actually done this several times by now. Or variations of this. They couldn’t always leave Chopper out, now, could they? 

 

Once they were actually inside the open basement with the concrete floor and the shitty hanging lights, Sanji lit a new cigarette because who the fuck was going to stop him, and wow, this really did look like a fight club. 

 

“Bar?” Nami asked, nodding towards it on the other far side of the room. 

 

“Yes.” 

 

They worked their way over, pushing past a lot of people—goddamn, there was kind of a shitload of people there, how had Sanji never even _heard_ of this before?—and once they got to the bar, they found Usopp and Chopper. 

 

Gross, sweaty beer in hand, Sanji mostly kept his head down. 

 

Just as they were starting to get their bearings, Luffy more or less bounced up to them from god only knew where. 

 

“You guys made it just in time!” he shouted over the noise, grinning at them, and he looked like he always did—shitty clothes and messy hair and goddamn sandals—but he seemed more in his element than Sanji had ever really seen him, somehow. He looked like he belonged. 

 

“Your directions sucked,” Nami said, sipping something that looked vodka-based. 

 

“Yeah, but I knew you’d find it,” Luffy replied, still smiling. He turned his body a little and pointed at the ring where two older-looking big-ass guys were slugging it out. “There’s where all the boxing stuff happens—” No shit. “—and I’m up next. So go bet on me! There’s a guy right over here—” 

 

“This doesn’t feel very legal,” Nami interrupted him, a hand on her hip. And then Usopp give her this _look_ that Sanji actually couldn’t really define, and once she saw Usopp’s face, the arm on her hip fell limp and she took a long drink. 

 

“I don’t think it is. But it’s fine, this place is totally safe,” Luffy said, cheery as ever.

 

“ _Safe?_ ” Chopper asked, both hands on his bottle of beer. 

 

“Yeah, like, uh, no cops will show up or anything.” Luffy gave Chopper a thumbs-up.

 

“Aren’t cops the ones who’re supposed to keep you safe—“ Chopper started, and Luffy just laughed. 

 

“Anyway,” Luffy said, clearing his throat into his fist, that smile still stuck on his face, “I’ll be right over there, and—“

 

As Luffy jerked his thumb over his shoulder, Sanji followed with his eyes, and he didn’t hear anything else that Luffy said at all. Because his gaze locked with Zoro's.

 

Zoro was standing across the room, next to some giant guy in a Hawaiian shirt, leaning against the back wall, looking relaxed as hell for someone who was about to probably get his ass handed to him, and he was looking right at them. Right at Sanji. 

 

Sanji’s stomach fell through the floor and into another time zone, and he immediately lowered his eyes—closed them completely—and he stuck the mouth of his bottle of beer to his lips and craned his neck back a little and more or less finished the entire thing in several long gulps. 

 

He maneuvered with a few slow and shifting steps so that he was standing more next to Luffy rather than across from him, putting his back to Zoro. 

 

“— and Zoro will be after that just a little later.” 

 

Sanji tuned back into whatever Luffy was saying at the drop of the name, and... Luffy really looked like a kid showing off his bedroom to a friend for the first time.

 

“You should see the guy they put him up against,” Luffy laughed. “He’s huge.” 

 

“You sound pretty hyped over it,” Usopp pointed out.

 

“Well, the big guys fall the hardest.” 

 

Sanji cleared his throat and Luffy looked over at him. 

 

“You think he’ll win?” 

 

Luffy snorted. “Oh, definitely.” 

 

“Why?” Sanji asked. 

 

“Haven’t you seen him fence? He’s fast. And he hits fucking _hard_ ,” Luffy grinned up at Sanji. 

 

Sanji _had_ seen him fence. He remembered watching Zoro once in September, staring at him through the gymnasium windows up at Sabaody, fucking unable to look away. He remembered. 

 

“Boxing’s different from fencing,” Sanji said, leaning past Luffy to leave his empty bottle on the small bar top they were still crowded around. 

 

“Is it? Well. I mean. I guess you’re right? But, I dunno, fighting is fighting,” Luffy shrugged, popping his knuckles. “Don’t worry about it—Zoro’s gonna win.” 

 

“I’m not _worried_ —“

 

“Shit, hey, I gotta go—but bet on me! Bet on both of us!” Luffy turned, heading towards the recently emptied boxing ring. He yelled over his shoulder, “You’ll walk out of here with more money than you came in with! You’ll see!” 

 

Well. He had confidence on his side, if nothing else.

 

“Illegalities aside, let’s bet on him,” Chopper said suddenly, looking around, probably searching for the guy Luffy mentioned that seemingly took bets.

 

Sanji and Nami and Usopp looked over at Chopper, who raised his eyebrows at the faces he was receiving. 

 

“What? I want free money,” Chopper explained, smiling a little. 

 

“Chopper,” Nami began, glancing over at the ring where Luffy was removing his shirt and kicking off his sandals, “Luffy’s, like, barely bigger than I am.” 

 

“You don’t think he’ll win?” Chopper asked, sipping his beer like he’d been drinking his whole life. Sanji wanted to smile. Chopper grew up fast. 

 

“I’m just saying, it’s not really smart to bet on something you’re not sure of,” she explained. 

 

“Well,” Chopper said, “He always pays his rent on time.” 

 

Nami paused. 

 

“And you know,” Chopper went on, “He never has a problem with paying for food. And he buys us a lot of alcohol. Like, all the time. And that Vespa probably wasn’t cheap. And, come on, you’ve _seen_ the wads of cash he—“ 

 

“You have a surprisingly good point,” Nami cut him off, reaching into her purse, a smile growing on her face as she said, “Okay. Let’s hurry up and find the bookie.” 

 

They found him easily enough. The bookie was standing behind a card table and a small crowd of people. 

 

Nami pushed her way forward, and the rest of them stuck close behind her. 

 

Chopper and Nami and Usopp all put money down on Luffy, and Sanji followed suit. He’d been paid recently, which was good, because things were getting tight with how financially and generally irresponsible he’d been lately. 

 

“Should we bet on Zoro?” Usopp asked, thumbing through his wallet. 

 

They looked at each other, mentally debating as a group.

 

None of them could afford to be too careless with their limited funds. 

 

A few seconds of silence passed. And then—

 

“Fuck it,” Sanji said, cutting into the lag that hung between them. He bet the rest of what was in his wallet on Zoro. 

 

Chopper was the first to follow his example, and Nami and Usopp both wound up doing the same. 

 

At least they were all in this together. Fiscally, anyway. 

 

When they pushed their way back to the ring, working their way between sweaty and shouting people, they managed to get a pretty decent spot. There was just standing room around the designated boxing space. It wasn’t even closed off—the people surrounding the ring formed its outline. 

 

Sanji scanned the crowd. Zoro was nowhere to be seen. But Luffy was right there, on the other side of the ring, standing next to that giant guy with the Hawaiian shirt—the same guy Zoro had been next to when Sanji saw him earlier. Someone Luffy knew, apparently. The guy was pushing boxing gloves onto Luffy’s fists, and he was saying something with a deep frown on his face, and Luffy was only smiling and laughing in response. The big guy didn’t look too happy about it. 

 

Giant Hawaiian-shirt-guy looked past Luffy, and Sanji followed his eyes, landing on a man who could only be Luffy’s opponent, judging from the obvious boxing gloves and look of general aggression plastered on his face. 

 

Fucking _shit_ , Luffy’s opponent was _big._ He was taller than Luffy—almost taller than Sanji—and Luffy was _obviously_ in the wrong fucking weight class because this guy had to have a good fifty pounds on him. Maybe more. He was built like a truck. Like Zoro, but _wider._  

 

“Is that the guy he’s fighting?” Nami asked, clearly noticing the same thing Sanji did. 

 

“Looks that way,” Sanji replied. 

 

“Did we fuck up just now I wonder,” Usopp said, looking Luffy’s opponent up and down with them. 

 

Chopper was staring with wide eyes. “Shit. Maybe.” 

 

Sanji clapped Chopper on the shoulder. “He’ll be alright.” 

 

Usopp snorted. “Whatever you say.” 

 

The four of them looked back at Luffy, who didn’t seem concerned in the slightest. Although, to be fair, Sanji had never actually seen Luffy look worried about anything. Ever. 

 

When Luffy turned and walked into the ring and faced his opponent, Sanji was stuck staring at Luffy’s bare chest. More specifically, he stared at the fucking giant scar that crossed over his bare chest. 

 

Luffy always wore shirts in the house. Maybe to cover the scar, actually. He didn’t seem embarrassed of it, and Sanji couldn’t imagine Luffy ever being embarrassed of anything, but shit, that thing was pretty goddamn grotesque. 

 

He didn’t get that kind of scar from a fucking boxing match. Come to think of it, Luffy had never explained _how_ he got that scar. Sanji remembered him mentioning it once, real quick, the first and only time he showed it off. Never said what happened. Just that Trafudgepacker Law was the one to fix him up. 

 

Sanji’s eyes drifted from the giant scar to the look on Luffy’s face. Never in his life had Sanji ever seen Luffy grin like that. 

 

There was an actual bell that was rung at the beginning of each match. Like it was the real fucking deal. And when that bell rang, Luffy moved almost faster than Sanji’s eyes could follow. 

 

Luffy nailed his opponent so hard in his stomach that he doubled over as Luffy bounced away, still grinning like a maniac. 

 

Fucking _shit._ Really? Did Luffy really hit that hard? 

 

When they met again, there was a lot more blocking on the opponent’s behalf. His arms looked like they were twice the size of Luffy’s, and he definitely had reach on his side, and he was kind of fast, too. They danced around each other and didn’t get much else in before the end of the first round. 

 

In the second round, the opponent popped Luffy hard right in his face—caught him as he was going in for an uppercut or something—and he hit hard enough that Luffy stumbled back, reaching up towards his bleeding nose before visibly realizing that his hand was still confined by a boxing glove. 

 

He wiped his nose along his forearm, licked his lips and spat red onto the concrete floor, and he actually _laughed._

 

_“_ That was a good one!” Sanji heard Luffy shout to his opponent, who snorted. 

 

Sanji glanced over at Nami and Usopp and Chopper, who were all watching with their mouths hanging open. 

 

Luffy genuinely looked like he was having so much _fun._

 

Sanji found himself smiling. Luffy was just contagious in that sense. 

 

The third round was the final round. 

 

Once Luffy found his opportunity, got inside his reach, he stood tall and hit the guy real hard in the side of his face, and again in his jaw, walking forward and rocking him again and again, and Luffy seemingly hit so fast, so hard, that this guy, who was considerably bigger than Luffy, couldn’t even do much to bring his arms up to his face to block. 

 

Luffy’s onslaught was overwhelming. And it didn’t make sense. He was too fast. Too strong for someone that small. But Luffy’s opponent hit the floor, knocked unconscious in the third round, nonetheless. 

 

Amidst all the loud cheering and shouting and swearing, Sanji looked over as Chopper said, “I kind of want to make sure that guy’s alright.” 

 

Nami laughed. “He’s fine, Chopper.” 

 

“I know he’s _fine_ , but he could have a concussion at the least—“ 

 

“Calm down,” Usopp said to Chopper, grinning, and then he looked at Nami. “We just won some money.” 

 

Sanji smiled because Nami and Usopp were smiling so hard, and they high-fived like they’d achieved some great victory, and they went to go collect their winnings with Chopper while Sanji opted to stand around and smoke another cigarette and hide in the crowd of people while he watched Luffy return to the giant guy in the Hawaiian shirt. 

 

The guy pulled Luffy’s gloves off him and he gave him a towel, and as Luffy was wiping himself down and talking to the big guy and bending down to grab the shirt he’d left laying on the concrete floor, Zoro walked up to the both of them. 

 

Sanji kept watching. 

 

Luffy turned so that the three of them stood together, and Luffy said something to Zoro, and Zoro actually _smiled_ back at him, and Sanji turned the fuck around so goddamn fast, he was back at the bar before he could even think about it. 

 

Fuck beer, he was moving onto straight liquor. 

 

He ordered a double whiskey and drank it immediately, and he put the charge on his goddamn credit card because he’d bet the rest of the money in his wallet on fucking Zoro, and that was _not_ how he meant to word that thought he’d just had there, god _fucking_ _damn it_.

 

Sanji almost kicked a hole in the shitty imitation wood of the bar, but instead of escalating to vandalism just yet, he took a deep breath, calmed himself, and ordered another double before going to find his friends. 

 

“Sanji!” 

 

He whipped around at the sound of Nami’s voice. 

 

“Hey, aren’t you going to collect all your winnings?” she asked, her arm linked around Usopp’s, drink in hand. Usopp was, however, engaged in conversation with Chopper, letting her pull him along while they talked. 

 

“Oh yeah.” Duh, idiot. “Uh, I’ll just wait until after Zoro’s match,” Sanji replied, drifting with her through the crowd, like they were looking for someplace to stand around, but it was so crowded, all they could really do was wander. 

 

“Can you believe!” Chopper said to them suddenly, breaking away from his previous conversation and pushing his way between them, holding onto a new beer. 

 

“Believe what—“ 

 

“Luffy kicked that guy’s _ass!”_

 

“He really did,” Usopp said. “That was messed up.” 

 

“No, that was _awesome_.” Chopper was grinning, and his cheeks were kind of red, probably from the alcohol, but also probably because they were all still wearing their coats when it was really warm with all those people crammed together in the basement. “I wonder if anyone ever gets seriously hurt? Are there doctors here? What’s the actual procedure here—“ 

 

“You can ask Luffy when we see him again,” Nami cut him off, stopping him before he could start rambling too much. 

 

Sanji kept drinking. He actively drank as much as he could while still remaining within the confines of being socially acceptable, regularly returning to the bar after he collected all the money he won from betting on Luffy. And it fucking sucked, because he wasn’t _nearly_ as drunk as he was trying to be by the time Zoro’s match was about to start. That was the problem with drinking all the time, wasn’t it. 

 

He chain smoked like he needed the nicotine more than air, which was kind of accurate, but that coupled with the whiskey was making his head feel kind of light and swimmy, which was actually _totally_ fine by him. 

 

Luffy found them before Zoro’s match started. 

 

“Hey, are there doctors here!” Chopper shouted immediately as soon as Luffy pushed his way up to them. 

 

Luffy was already laughing, “Chopper, don’t _worry about it—“_

 

“When’s Zoro’s match?” Nami asked, shifting her weight. “This place smells bad and I’m over it.” 

 

“He’s up real soon, maybe next? That’s why I came to find you guys,” Luffy replied, reaching for Chopper’s drink, saying something like, “Lemme have this, I’m so _thirsty_ ,” as he snatched it from his hand.

 

Chopper let him have it, and none of them bothered to tell Luffy that the beer he was chugging wasn’t going to do much to rehydrate him, but Chopper did ask, “Hey, Luffy—where’d you learn to fight like that?” 

 

Luffy pulled the bottle from his lips and swallowed hard and smiled at Chopper and shrugged his shoulders. 

 

The bell that signaled the start of a match rang throughout the sweaty basement, and Luffy turned his head.

 

“That could be Zoro—probably is Zoro—let’s go —“ he said quickly as he grabbed Chopper by the wrist and yanked him towards the ring. Nami and Usopp followed, with Sanji trailing a bit behind. 

 

As they shoved their way up to the ring, with Luffy clearing the way a whole lot, Sanji could see him. 

 

He could see Zoro, right in the middle of the ring, standing there without a shirt or shoes on, squaring off against an opponent who was, as Luffy put it, _huge._ And Zoro looked totally fearless. If anything, the look on his face was... Sanji swallowed. He looked excited. 

 

Sanji found himself at the edge of the ring, standing between Luffy and Nami, and his hands found his pockets. 

 

Huge Guy had dark hair and a look plastered across his face that screamed confidence. 

 

“This guy’s been around a while,” Luffy said to Sanji, and for a moment, Sanji looked away from the ring. Luffy was still watching them as he continued, “He has a reputation around here. I was kind of surprised Zoro got paired up with him for his first match ever.” 

 

Sanji didn’t know why Luffy chose to tell him this. Nobody else was listening. Probably nobody else could hear him over the loud cheering and shouting. 

 

“But it’s gonna be cool,” Luffy said after a couple seconds. “Zoro’s gonna fuck this guy up.” 

 

Luffy grinned up at Sanji, and Sanji said nothing. Instead, he looked back at the two fighters in the ring. 

 

The first round was... well. Sanji watched Zoro watching the guy, watched his eyes, watched him block a few punches before the huge guy got a real good hit in on Zoro’s gut, and Sanji could see Zoro’s eyes widen a bit as he started to double over, but he shot back up and blocked the next punch aimed at his face. 

 

The fists balled in Sanji’s pockets tightened when Zoro got hit again, another to the stomach, and once on his side, before the round was over. 

 

The second round didn’t start off much better. Zoro did a good job of defending his head, but he wasn’t as quick with anything aimed at his body, and he took these solid hits that pushed him backwards, and the crowd even made communal _“Oooh!”_ sounds when the big guy landed a few strong punches that kind of looked like they could’ve cracked Zoro’s whole ribcage in half. 

 

Jesus. Sanji grit his teeth together. 

 

“Zoro!” Luffy suddenly shouted, cupping his hands around his mouth, and Zoro actually glanced over at them—he’d heard Luffy—and his eyes bounced from Luffy to Sanji standing next to him, and back to Luffy real quick as he shouted, “You got this!” 

 

Zoro looked back at his opponent just in time to block another strong punch aimed right between his eyes, and he took a few steps back, the momentum knocking him backwards a little. 

 

“Zoro!” 

 

He looked over again, breathing heavily, sweat dripping from his face. 

 

“Do your thing, Zoro! Lay him out!” 

 

There was a short nod before Zoro turned his attention fully back on his opponent, and he brought his hands back up in front of his face, ducking his head just slightly, looking more determined and collected than Sanji had ever really seem him look. He was completely... 

 

Fuck.

 

The guy threw another punch and Zoro ducked, still blocking, ready for the follow-up punch like he knew it was coming. He kept blocking, and he kept dodging, slipping out of the way, side-stepping, and then, when the huge guy came at him with a lunge and a snap of his arm, Zoro reacted like he was _waiting_ for it the whole time, and he leaned around it, took a step forward, threw his whole body into the weight behind his shoulder, and he launched the meanest punch Sanji had ever really seen in his life right into the huge guy’s fucking face. Just fucking smashed it.

 

Zoro’s opponent actually staggered backwards. Sanji could already see blood starting to drip from his face. 

 

“Keep going!” Luffy screamed from beside Sanji, his voice cracking with the volume. “ _Zoro!_ Get him, Zoro! ” 

 

Zoro didn’t look over at them. But Sanji could see him grit his teeth and narrow his eyes, and he followed with his momentum, stepping inside his opponent’s reach, and he hit him again, maybe harder this time, square in the jaw. 

 

The crowd started getting louder. Sanji could feel people pushing at his back, but he held steady, rooted in his spot. Lips pressed tight together. 

 

The huge guy had his arms up now, trying to protect his face, but Zoro hit around him, and _through_ him. He didn’t let up. 

 

He completely overwhelmed him. 

 

Three more solid hits—one to the his opponent’s temple, once to his stomach, and once more, square in the mouth—caught him as he was starting to double over—and the huge guy’s head snapped back so quickly that Zoro didn’t follow with anything else.

 

His opponent’s eyes rolled back with that final snap, and he fell backwards, crumbled to the ground at Zoro’s feet, knocked out at the end of the second round. 

 

While the crowd of people around him completely exploded, erupting with a decibel level unheard yet that night, caught up in the uproar of what was clearly a major upset, Sanji remained completely still. 

 

Zoro stood over his opponent, chest heaving, mouth hanging open, breathing so heavily and looking down at the unconscious man on the floor, and after a second, Sanji could see the smile growing over parted lips. 

 

Luffy rushed to the center of the ring, grabbing Zoro by the wrist and throwing his arm into the air, shouting and cheering, and Zoro finally looked up, looked at Luffy, smiling, the muscles in his stomach tightening with every heavy breath, and Sanji glanced over at Nami, who was jumping and cheering with Usopp and Chopper. 

 

“I’m leaving,” he said to her as he turned, and she suddenly stopped mid-cheer, and she reached to grab Sanji by his forearm. 

 

“Wait, what!” 

 

“I’m going—I have to—I need to —“ Sanji was saying, not even looking at her as he kept walking, trying not to pull her but certainly not letting her keep him there. He couldn’t think of the words. Couldn’t come up with the excuse. Couldn’t string the goddamn sentence together like he was normally so good at doing. 

 

“Sanji!” Nami said, jogging a few steps to stay with him, a hand still in the crook of his arm, “Hey, you can’t just—“ 

 

“There’s a bus stop a block from here, we passed it on the way in—“ Sanji cut her off, and he finally looked down at her, and he didn’t know what the look on his own face was like at that moment, but she shut up either way when she saw him. He took a deep breath and said, “Everything’s fine, I just don’t feel well and I’m going home.” 

 

She frowned. But she didn’t say anything. She let go of his arm. 

 

“Sorry,” he said, and he turned and slipped into the big crowd of people around them, went straight to the bookie and collected all his money, and he thought about how many bottles of liquor he could buy with all the cash he’d just jammed in his pockets as he made straight for the exit and took the stairs two at a time. 

 

At the bus stop, Sanji did not stop smoking and pacing slowly back and forth, eyes on the ground the whole time. 

 

When the bus finally arrived, Sanji walked his shivering ass to the back and sat down and glared at his own lap. 

 

By the time the bus rolled up to the stop near the Sunny, he was hunched over, elbows digging into his knees, holding his face in his hands. 

 

As he walked the couple blocks to the house, his mind played in loops, and he couldn’t do anything to stop it, so he lit a cigarette, and every drag he took was as deep and as long as he could manage. 

 

He stood in front of the house, blowing smoke at it, one hand shoved in his pocket while he stared at the big orange and red and yellow lion painted on the front door that smiled at him from across the yard. 

 

Sanji dropped the smoldering butt of his cigarette on the ground and stepped on it as he walked towards the front door, heels dragging, and he couldn’t even fucking bring himself to go inside. 

 

After a couple seconds of standing there, he sat down on the porch stairs, hugged his jacket tighter around himself, and pulled his phone from his pocket. 

 

This was so fucking stupid. 

 

He didn’t know what to do. Or what the hell was going on. 

 

He had a headache from smoking too much and drinking too much straight liquor too fast and the look on Zoro’s goddamn face when he knocked that fucker out cold. 

 

God dammit. 

 

Who the fuck was he kidding. He did know. He fucking knew. He knew what was going on, and he knew what the hell it meant. 

 

Sanji knew what the fuck was going on when he saw Zoro fencing up at Sabaody in September. He knew in October, from the way his stomach felt when he saw Zoro talking to some buff-looking bartender on the back patio of Ivankov’s, and from the way he’d hurried to find anyone else to talk to in that moment, anyone else to look at. He knew in November, when he requested off work for the first time ever since landing his job at Mariejois so that he could get everyone together at Nami’s bar for Zoro’s fucking birthday. He knew when he said he’d help Zoro study for his fucking finals.

 

He knew from the goddamn moment in December, when Zoro had told him about his exam grades, when he’d _smiled_ right fucking at him **—** because of something _he_ had done, something Sanji was directly responsible for—and he knew what the feeling in his chest and his stomach and his fingertips all fucking _meant._

 

Sanji chewed on his chapped lip and scrolled the long list of contacts in his phone. 

 

Fuck.

 

Yeah, no, he couldn’t do this. 

 

He couldn’t. 

 

God. Fuck.

 

_You should man up and stop running away._

 

“God fucking damn it,” Sanji said under his breath, alone in the dark, his face lit up by the long list of names on the screen of his phone. 

 

_You’re stronger than this, Sanji._

 

He didn’t believe her. But after a few seconds of staring at names that he couldn’t even really see, that all bled together and faded into the background, Sanji sighed, and he clicked the button on the side of his phone that turned the screen off, and he stood up slowly. 

 

He pulled another cigarette from his pack, and he stuck it between his lips, and he shoved his phone back in his pocket and turned, and after taking one more deep breath, he lit his cigarette and walked inside the empty house. 

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

It was Franky's laugh that led her to him.

 

Robin was unfamiliar with the expansive park that covered an entire block of their neighboring city.It was large and crowded, and Robin already had her cell phone in her hand, ready to pull up his name in her contact list.  

 

And then she heard it—that booming laugh that always seemed to tear through the general din around her.The same laugh that had made her aware of Franky when she only knew him as Professor Cutty Flam.

 

Once she knew the general direction to look, it wasn't hard to spot him, running along a stretch of dead winter grass.He jumped up into the air, snatching a red disc that had nearly buzzed right past him.As soon as his feet touched the ground, he twisted his body and threw it with an admirable agility, and two men who looked to be barely in their twenties both dove for it.

 

So Franky was playing an impromptu game of frisbee—she pressed her lips together, holding back a smile.That was just like him, getting drawn into what was going on around him, never content with just quietly observing.  

 

She decided she'd take a seat on a nearby park bench for a while and watch.But as soon as she sat down, Franky spotted her and started waving.

 

“Robin!” 

 

He smiled, one of those huge smiles that transformed his entire face, and Robin sat up a little straighter.

 

“Give me one second!” he shouted.

 

Robin simply nodded in reply—her voice couldn't easily travel across the distances that his could.

 

After a couple of quick words with the group of young men he'd been playing with, he hurried over to her, unzipping his jacket as he walked. 

 

“So?How'd it go?”

 

“It was... productive,” she answered cautiously.  

 

“Yeah?Did they like your ideas?”  

 

Franky didn't break eye contact even as he plopped down beside her.He looked like he genuinely wanted to hear about minutia of her meeting—even if a table full of professors and historians discussing timelines and scope for an educational history series was far from interesting.

 

“They did,” she smiled, turning her head away for a second.  

 

Indeed, they had liked her suggestions more than she could have anticipated.After the meeting adjourned, the lead coordinator had asked her to stay behind for a little while to discuss something.And that discussion had been a job offer.  

 

They were going to email her the details later.All she knew at this point was the salary and certain bonuses—like moving expenses.Because if she took it, it'd require moving to the other side of the country.

 

There was no point in bringing it up at the moment, though.She needed time to consider.

 

“The meeting did run a little long though,” Robin went on, looking up at Franky again.“Sorry for making you wait.”

 

“What do you mean?You've got to be early—” Franky pulled his phone out of his pocket, glancing at the time.He looked genuinely surprised at the results, and he laughed as he sank backward, stretching out his arms along the back of the bench, letting his fingertips rest lightly on Robin's back.“I guess I lost track of time.”

 

“Seems pretty unlike you,” Robin teased, giving him a sidelong glance.

 

The air still carried the crispness of winter, but the temperature was milder than it had been lately.It was almost spring—and it was strange to think that it'd been fall when she and Franky had first started meeting regularly.Everything still felt new and exciting.  

 

She wondered if they would still talk like this, if they couldn't see each other regularly.

 

Keeping in touch had never been one of Robin's strengths.

 

“You still want to check out that exhibit?”

 

Franky wrenched her out of her thoughts.

 

“Of course,” she replied.She already knew the answer to her question.

 

A classmate of Franky's from graduate school had been working on a model exoskeleton that was being featured at an exhibition downtown.During the three block walk to the conference center, as Franky asked her questions about her meeting, Robin noticed their strides always matched up nicely, and they never strayed more than a foot or so from one another.

 

It was a comfortable and safe distance.

 

As they perused the exhibits, Franky slipped into the role of the brilliant charismatic teacher Robin had only gotten to see glimpses of when she'd happened to walk past his classroom in the middle of a lecture.He was familiar with almost everything they came across.  

 

“Oh, I remember reading about this—the RNS stimulator!” he exclaimed, pointing at a display with a small metal device.He turned toward Robin excitedly.“So someone with epilepsy gets this tiny computer surgically implanted in their brain, and whenever a seizure is coming on, it senses it and gives the brain a little zap." Franky tapped his temple and smiled."Stops the seizure from happening.”

 

Franky continued describing how it worked and all of the interesting facts he recalled about it.Robin wasn't actually sure if it was for her benefit or his, but either way, she slipped beside him and listened intently.

 

She enjoyed every second of it, to be honest.

 

As they approached the next display—some sort of biomedical vest, used to diagnose heart problems—Robin noticed a mop of chocolate-brown hair that she thought was rather familiar.The young boy was standing on his toes, peering over the shoulder of a balding man standing in front of him, clearly not quite able to see what he wanted to.  

 

He turned around, his shoulders slightly slumped, and it was definitely the freckled face she expected.

 

Robin took a step toward the young man, smiling in greeting.“Hi, Chopper.”

 

He widened his already rather large eyes.  

 

“Oh, uh, hi, Professor!” he called out quickly, straightening up his previously slouched back.

 

“What brings you here today?”

 

“I'm—I just came to look around.”

 

He looked nervous, as though she'd caught him someplace embarrassing.Chopper's eyes quickly darted over to Franky.Or more accurately, _up_ to Franky.  

 

Hopefully an introduction would make him look less nervous.  

 

“This is Tony Chopper.He's in my Non-Western Civilizations class this semester,” Robin said to Franky.His first name was actually Tony, she recalled, but he preferred to go by his surname.“And Chopper, this is Professor Cutty Flam—”

 

“—Franky,” he cut in before Robin could finish pronouncing his entire name.He extended his hand, and Franky's fist nearly swallowed Chopper's in its entirety. 

 

“Professor Franky—oh! I think my friend Usopp is in your class!” Chopper perked up. 

 

“Usopp? Yeah, he's been a student of mine for awhile now,” Franky grinned.“So he's a friend of yours, huh?”

 

“Yep.We're also roommates.”Chopper looked back over at Robin.“I'm not sure if you remember the people I usually sit with—“

 

“Nami and Sanji, right?” 

 

Robin always made it a point to remember the names of her students.

 

Chopper was noticeably surprised, but after a quick second or two, he managed to say, “Uh, yeah, that's right.We all live together.”

 

“I didn't know that,” Robin said.“You seem to get along well, though, so I'm not surprised.Are any of them here today?”

 

“Oh, um—no, I'm by myself.”

 

“So you're a science nerd. I am too,” Franky grinned, and Chopper had to crane his neck pretty high to actually make eye contact with him.

 

“Uh—I guess I am,” Chopper said, a little unsure of himself.But after a beat, he gained more confidence, a smile growing on his face.“Yeah, I mean, especially anything with medical advancements.”

 

The comment jogged her memory.

 

“You're going to become a doctor, isn't that right?” she asked.

 

For some reason, Chopper blushed a little.“Yes, but uh, I have a long way to go—I'm only in premed right now.”

 

“Oh, a doctor!Perfect!”Franky boomed.“So you must know all about these things—where's the best stuff?”

 

“Like—is there something specific you want to see?”

 

“Nah, I mean, what's the coolest thing here?”  

 

“The coolest,” Chopper hummed, furrowing his brow, bringing his fingers to his lips as he contemplated the question.“There are so many...” 

 

Franky glanced over at Robin, grinning.“We're here to check out that exoskeleton—“

 

“Oh, the exoskeleton!Yes!” Chopper's expression came alive, with an enthusiasm that might've rivaled Franky's, if such a thing were actually possible.Which was most likely _not_ the case—Franky was already starting to get that look in his eyes, seeing Chopper looking so excited about his friend's invention. “It was _so awesome_.”

 

“Yeah, you liked it?”  

 

From the look on Franky's face, someone would've thought he'd built the thing himself.

 

“Yeah, they were doing demonstrations with it earlier, and it was just—it was amazing! Unbelievable!I mean, it reads _brain waves_ to move.No outward controls!”

 

“I heard the neural-computer interface was improved drastically compared to earlier models,” Franky added.

 

“You don't even know!”  

 

Chopper started speaking at a frantic pace, going on about kinematic control and EEG and EMG signals, and Robin had never seen this side of him before, but it was quite endearing.Franky was likely already more than familiar with all of the information Chopper was giving him, but he chimed in with comments like he wanted to hear more.As Chopper went on and on, Franky's smile grew bigger and bigger.  

 

She realized hers was, too.

 

Seeing her students this excited over a topic was wonderful.Robin wanted all of her students to share that kind of enthusiasm about learning, no matter what the topic—and she was perhaps a little inappropriately proud of Chopper for figuring out what he was passionate about at such a young age.

 

“The steps that someone can take with it—they're not necessary _perfect_ ,” Chopper continued, waving his hands a lot as he spoke.“Like, the woman who was using it—each step she took was pretty jerky.But the thing is, she was able to _take_ steps, even though she was paralyzed from the waist down!And they're only just getting started, so think about what will happen when... when they improve it...”

 

Chopper's rapid speech very abruptly slowed, until he finally just stopped, his eyes trailing off in sync with his words.  

 

Robin glanced in the direction of where he was looking, although nothing looked out of the ordinary.It was just a group of people standing together—two older men, one of them with curly white hair, a young man with a rather unflattering tie, and a young woman with her long, blonde hair tied back in a ponytail.

 

"Shit... Okay..." Chopper said so very quietly, clearly speaking to himself at this point, and Robin fought a smile.

 

“You okay?”  

 

Franky beat her to the punch.

 

“Oh! Uh, yeah! Yeah, um, I'm fine,” Chopper replied quickly, his voice cracking a little as he glanced up at Franky.

 

Almost immediately, Chopper's eyes darted back to the group of people. Specifically, the young blonde woman standing between the other two men.

 

“Friend of yours?” Robin asked.

 

Chopper's eyes snapped to hers.“Oh, no! Uh, well...” His gaze fell to the floor.“Maybe.I don't think so?”

 

“If you know one of them, you should go say hi.”Franky clapped him on the shoulder.

 

“Oh no, I couldn't,” he replied quickly, wringing his hands together.“There's no way I can bother her like that, she's so busy, and smart, and—“ 

 

Suddenly he fell silent.Robin looked over at Franky, and he had a knowing look in his eye.

 

“There's never any harm in saying hello,” Robin assured him.“It's good networking.”

 

“Networking, yeah,” he repeated quietly.“Yeah, networking is important, that's right.Okay.M-maybe I should—I mean, yeah, I should go say hi then, shouldn't I?”

 

“Absolutely,” Robin replied.  

 

Franky gave him a thumbs up.  

 

“Okay, I'll—I'll go then.”

 

She carefully hid her amusement as they said their goodbyes and Chopper resolutely marched away. Even if she didn't know the full breadth of what she'd been encouraging, at the very least, it couldn't hurt if Chopper overcame a little of his apparent shyness.

 

But as soon as her eyes met Franky's again, she lost it, and she felt the smile she'd been holding back spread across her face.

 

They didn't need to speak further on the matter.

 

By the time they drove back to town, it was dark, but not actually that late.Traffic was unsurprisingly heavy for a Saturday night and it took them well over an hour to get back home.Their leisurely conversation made it feel like only a sliver of that time has passed.

 

At some point, her phone vibrated, and with a glance at the screen, she knew it was the email with information regarding her job offer.  

 

She didn't open it.

 

The thing was, Robin quite liked the way things were right now.With her life, and with Franky in particular.They casually spent most of their free time together, and it wasn't really anything beyond that.

 

The status quo was just perfect—which was a word Robin usually refrained from using, but when it came to the way things were between her and Franky, it truly fit.And since so few things in life were ever perfect, she had been reluctant to do or say anything to change that dynamic. 

 

By the time they had reached her street, Robin came to the conclusion that she couldn't put it off any longer. She'd end the date tonight—no inviting him in, no spending half the night watching movies and drinking wine.And from now on, she would be more wary.Perhaps seeing him less would be a good start.

 

Robin wasn't afraid of exploring unknown territory in new and unfamiliar places—but for some reason, this was a bit terrifying.

 

Franky parked the car and her stomach clenched.

 

“Thank you for coming with me today,” Robin told him, as her hand crept toward the car door handle.  

 

Normally she'd invite him up right now.

 

“No need to thank me, I had a blast.We should go to the city more often.”

 

“Perhaps we should.”Robin smiled—a cautious smile.If only she'd remembered to exercise caution around Franky more often lately. 

 

Franky was sharp.A lot of people mistook him for being absentminded or having his head in the clouds because of his enthusiasm and vigor.But even if it seemed like he was joking around, paying no heed to the things transpiring around him, his mind always taking in a multitude of details.  

 

Robin knew how quickly his mind worked—and she caught the flicker of recognition in his eyes.He'd already noticed the shift in her demeanor.

 

“Is something wrong?”

 

“No, I'm just a little tired.It's been a long day.” 

 

“Yeah?” A crease formed in Franky's brow.  

 

Yes, this wasn't like her, was it.Taking in a deep breath, she smiled at him—a more sincere looking smile.Even if it wasn't.  

 

That expression he was making—she needed to go.

 

“I'll see you on Monday, then.”  

 

Robin pulled on the door handle, but the door didn't give.Franky's car doors automatically locked until the car was turned off.She'd made the mistake one time and had remembered it every time since.Except right now. 

 

As she pressed her finger on the unlock button, Franky's hand slipped into her free hand.His hands were always warm and a little calloused, stronger than her own, and they always made her want to squeeze back.

 

And she did.Because, well—it wasn't as though Robin was attempting to create actual _physical_ distance.Just some emotional distance.Because if Franky kept looking at her in that particular way, she wasn't sure if— 

 

“Let's do something tomorrow.”He tightened his grip around her hand.“I don't want to wait until Monday to see you.”

 

His tone made her feel like she couldn't take in a decent breath.She pulled her hand away.

 

“I have so many things I need to work on.”

 

“Then do those first.And let me see you after you're done.”  

 

She wished his insistence wasn't so charming.She faltered for a moment.

 

“I don't think it's a good idea.You told me you have a lot to do, as well—”

 

“Don't worry about me, I'll stay up late tomorrow or get up early on Monday or something.”He leaned over toward her, just slightly.“Either way, I’d rather see you than sleep. I’ll sleep when I’m old.”

 

His smile was so piercingly honest and she didn't know what to do, with him staring at her like that.

 

“You creep. We’re already old,” she smiled, her breath controlled like her expression and her words.

 

Franky laughed, a little softly.“Yeah, I guess so.I didn't mean it like that though.Just that I can shuffle around what I need to do.”

 

“I see.Haven't we spent nearly all day together?”She said it lightly—teasingly, almost.But her heart was pounding.

 

“Well, sure.But that's today.And you know, I'd like to—well.This might be another one of those creepy lines, but I’d like to see you as much as possible.”

 

“Oh, sure,” she waved a hand at him playfully.

 

Robin didn't know why she didn't just leave the car. 

 

“Yeah—as in, every day.”

 

“Wouldn't that be exhausting.How long would you keep that up?”  

 

And then, his smile faded a little, and Robin knew she'd delayed too long.

 

“For as long as you'll let me.”

 

Robin didn't exhale for a few seconds.Her mind felt like it stopped for a moment—although her heart apparently hadn't gotten the message.

 

This was the topic she hadn't wanted to broach.But it was here.

 

Damn.

 

“That's flattering, Franky.I enjoy spending time with you as well.” Robin spoke slowly, in contrast to her racing mind, trying to figure out exactly what to say.

 

She was usually great at communicating with people.But she was coming up blank.

 

It was her own fault, though.She should have brought this up before.

 

She pressed her lips together.

 

“I've been selfish, and I owe you an apology, Franky.”

 

“You're not selfish at all—”

 

“I am, because I didn't make things clear with you from the very beginning.But no matter how much I enjoy spending time with you, I'm not interested in what you're alluding to.”She dug her nails into her palms.“I've never been looking for anything serious.”

 

“Yeah, funny, isn't it?”Franky grinned, rapping the fingers of his left hand on the steering wheel.“Neither have I.”

 

She paused for a moment—it wasn't what she'd anticipated he'd say. But Franky had always said such unexpected things.

 

“Nothing serious is going to come of this for me.This is fun—” Robin realized it wasn't a word she used that often, “—but no matter how fun it is, this is all it's going to be for me.I don't have the time for anything beyond that.”

 

As soon as she said it, she felt a swell of guilt.After all, Franky had _just_ said he'd make the time for her—she shifted in her seat, a little anxiously, but she concentrated on keeping her face even and level.  

 

This was hard—more difficult that she could have ever anticipated.But it'd be more difficult if he noticed the impact it was having on her.

 

“Yeah, that's fair,” Franky nodded agreeably. Surprisingly agreeably.“I know how much you're always working on.And sure, I have a lot of stuff I need to take care of, too.”

 

Robin should have felt relieved.She realized she'd been clenching her jaw. 

 

“It's unrealistic for both of us.”Her voice was much softer than she'd meant for it to be.

 

Franky nodded again, sighing slightly as he leaned back in the car seat a bit.  

 

He turned to look at her.

 

“But see, the problem with that—” 

 

As they made eye contact, Robin thought it was odd that he was smiling, just faintly.

 

“—is that I'm super in love with you, Robin.”

 

She couldn't hear anything but her own heartbeat for the next several seconds.Maybe she forgot to breathe for a second too—when she finally drew in a breath, it was shallow and unsatisfying.

 

Franky's words had been what she had been fearing the most.But for some reason, it wasn't followed by the dread she had expected.

 

Instead, her mind drifted to the time she had told Franky about the reason she was teaching now—and the feeling she had when Franky wholeheartedly supported that decision.

 

It was hardly a puzzle that needed to be solved.That light, fluttery feeling washing over her perfectly resembled the feeling at that time.Except this time, the feeling was much, much stronger.

 

Franky had fallen in love with her.  

 

And maybe since that time, she had been falling in love with him too.

 

Robin turned towards him and met his gaze again. He was a person who was always smiling and laughing, and he pulled her attention like a magnet from across the room. And he looked so gravely serious in that moment. 

 

This whole thing… it began a long time ago, didn’t it. Perhaps even before she and Professor Cutty Flam had ever exchanged more than a handful of words as they passed each other in the hallway. 

 

She thought about her phone in her purse, and the email she hadn’t read yet, and the job offer and the salary and the bonus and everything. 

 

“I’ll call you,” Robin said a little quietly, her fingers curling around the handle on the car door. 

 

“Okay,” he said simply. 

 

As the email flashed through her mind again, she looked over at him once more before opening the door. And then she also thought about her current job, and teaching in general, and her students and the school and… all the things she loved. That she really did love, so much. 

 

“I’m going to call you tomorrow. Early tomorrow. In the morning,” she said, unthinking, her voice finding her, and her words were firm, fueled and strengthened by something undefined inside of her. 

 

He smiled. It was genuine and warm, and with that, she smiled too, a little. 

 

“Okay.”

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Zoro had a paper due tomorrow.Normally, he would've been sitting in his room, feeling more and more like shit as he tried to finish it.To make it sound like he actually knew the difference between creating demand and adjusting monetary supply. Or something like that.He wasn't even sure if that was a real thing—that was how good he felt about this paper.

 

Instead, he was standing the front yard of the Sunny, practicing boxing.There was only an hour or so left of daylight, and he wanted to take advantage of it.The paper was mostly done, anyway, and a couple hours wouldn't change how hard he was probably going to bomb it. 

 

The first time Zoro had tried shadow-boxing, he'd felt kind of dumb.Pretending to fight an invisible opponent.Felt like trying to fight a goddamn ghost.But as he started to get the hang of it, he started liking it.He'd even started watching old boxing matches for inspiration. 

 

Not to mention, he could always fall back on the memory of his very first fight.Shifting his feet, he drew all of his power into the muscles in his right arm and shoulder, throwing a devastating right straight—the same KO punch he'd knocked his first opponent out with.

 

He grinned a little, in spite of himself.

 

"You look like a dumbass.” 

 

Zoro didn't usually spook, but the sound of Sanji's voice suddenly coming from a few feet behind him nearly made him jump.Zoro hadn't even heard his footsteps.Usually Sanji's stupid oxfords made a ton of noise. 

 

Zoro tightened the fists he was already making, barely glancing over at him.Sanji was hugging his arms around the sleeves of a dark blue sweater, obviously freezing his ass off on the walk back from the bus stop or wherever the hell he'd been.

 

“At least I know to wear a coat when it's thirty degrees out.”

 

Rolling his eyes, Sanji stopped near the steps to the porch, sticking an unlit cigarette between his lips. 

 

“I'm sure that ugly-ass track jacket is keeping you real goddamn warm,” he muttered as he brought a lighter up to his cigarette, cupping his hands around it.Once it was lit, he look a few long puffs, and his lips were a little bit cracked.

 

Zoro turned away, facing his back toward him.He didn't have time for whatever the hell was going through Sanji's head that'd make him suddenly goddamn start talking to him, when they hadn't really spoken in... fuck, over a month.It was easier to just focus on practicing—Sanji was just going to head inside in a second, anyway.  

 

Except a couple minutes passed, and he _didn't._ Zoro turned his body, and as he released a nasty uppercut, he discreetly glanced over at the front of the Sunny.Sanji was still on the porch, sitting on the top step.

 

What the hell.

 

He glanced over a few more times, and Sanji was still there, watching him.When he saw Zoro was looking at him, he smirked—that cocky, obnoxious smirk that made Zoro feel like his insides were being squeezed.He blew out a stream of smoke and called out to him.

 

“The longer I watch, the dumber you look.”

 

“Then don't fucking watch.”

 

Clenching his jaw, he tried to concentrate on his footwork and his form—on dodging imaginary blows and his counterattacks—and not to think about the feeling of Sanji's eyes burning a goddamn hole in his back.  

 

“At least get a punching bag or something.”

 

Zoro turned around, glaring at him, at the stupid fucking cloud of smoke around him.  

 

“Are you volunteering?”  

 

For a split second, Sanji's face was blank, but then that goddamn smirk came back as he flicked the butt of his cigarette into the grass.

 

“You couldn't even land one hit on me, you stupid idiot,” Sanji said.“I'd fuck you up.”

 

Zoro found himself popping his knuckles.  

 

“Pff.You could _try,_ ” Zoro replied.

 

He slowly inhaled and didn't let his breath out for a couple of seconds.He didn't know why he'd said that.  

 

He could see Sanji's brow twitching as he stood up, and Zoro felt the corner of his lips tugging upward.

 

“Maybe I will.Wiping that shitty smile off your face is pretty tempting.”

 

Zoro squinted up at him as he shielded his eyes from the sun setting in the distance.  

 

“Are you actually going to do something, or are you just gonna talk about it all day?”

 

Sanji rolled his eyes, shoving his hands in his pockets.“Forget it, you're not worth the wear and tear on my fists.”

 

“Your _fists_ are what you're worried about?” Zoro forced a laugh, crossing his arms.“You should probably worry about your goddamn face first.”

 

“And you should be worried about how you're going to feed yourself if I break a hand.”

 

“The same way I fed myself most of last month, probably.”

 

Sanji's face faltered for just a moment.Zoro knew he was a pretty big asshole to say it.But hell, it was true.He was fine whether Sanji was around or not.

 

“Yeah, I've seen how you 'eat' on your own,” Sanji recovered, reaching in his pocket for another cigarette.“Frozen pizza and ramen noodles.”

 

Sanji's smile was so fucking— _haughty,_ goddamn, he'd probably never used that word in his entire life, but his hand was involuntarily balling into a fist just looking at him, as he lit another stupid cigarette.

 

But this shit was not how he needed to spend his time.It was useless—a total waste.Closing his eyes, he drew in a long breath, focusing on the calming sensation of air filling his lungs.The steady rise and fall of his chest, as he slowly exhaled.It was a technique he used to use in fencing, when he got too fired up, and it worked just as well now.  

 

“I don't have time for you or your shit,” Zoro replied flatly.  

 

Then he took a few steps away, putting extra space between them.When he felt like he was a reasonable distance away, he bent his knees, dropping his hips and resuming his stance.

There was an absence of sound outside.Zoro couldn't hear anything except his fists cutting through the air and Sanji puffing on his cigarette behind him.He sounded pissed off.But then, he sounded pissed off a lot.

 

“I don't see how you have time for this shit,” Sanji called out.“I bet you haven't even started the marketing project.”

 

“No, but I'll get it done,” Zoro replied, trying to concentrate on keeping his front toe lined up with his back heel.  

 

Zoro had actually forgotten they even had that class together this semester. Sanji had shown up maybe twice total. So he could shut the fuck up. What a fucking hypocrite.

 

“A couple of months ago, all you could do was whine about your grades,” Sanji added.

 

“And a lot of good that did me,” Zoro replied, throwing three sharp jabs.

 

“You're still enrolled in classes, you stupid shit.You're going to fail.”He was starting to speak a little more quickly now.

 

“Maybe,”Zoro shrugged.“Won't be the first time.”  

 

It wasn't like he'd given up.And it sure as hell wasn't any of Sanji's business.But for some reason, even as Zoro tried to ignore him, Sanji wouldn't fucking let it go.

 

“Forget about how long it's going to take you to graduate.If your GPA gets much lower, you could get expelled.”  

 

Maybe it was just his imagination, but it sounded like Sanji's pronunciation was starting to slip. Zoro paused, still holding his stance as he glanced over at him. 

 

“You don't even know what my GPA is.”

 

“I can guess,” Sanji snorted, with a wave of his hands.His movements were quick and jerky.“Why don't you just drop the class, if you're going to fuck around like this.” 

 

“Maybe I will,” Zoro responded flatly.  

 

“God damn it, you're such a hypocrite.You probably should've dropped half your classes last semester, but instead you whined about how you _had_ to stay in them all, no matter what.”

 

“Shit's changed.”

 

Sanji took the last drag from his cigarette and threw it on the ground, stomping it under his shoe.He'd gone through that one fast. 

 

“I can't believe I tried to help you last semester,” Sanji went on.“What a fucking waste of time.”

 

“Yeah, especially since you did such great things with your time after that.”  

 

Zoro hadn't really thought out the response.He just let words fall out of his mouth around Sanji, which was a pretty awful habit.

 

Sanji didn't say anything, and Zoro didn't give a shit if Sanji was offended, so after a brief silence, he started practicing again.He didn't have much more time tonight.No matter what Sanji thought about him, he was still trying to do his school work.And he needed at least a few more hours on that paper.

 

From somewhere out of the corner of his eye, he could see Sanji staring down at his phone screen. 

 

“Okay,” Sanji said suddenly, shoving his phone in his pocket.

 

“What?”

 

He glared at Zoro as he rolled up the sleeves of his sweater. 

 

“I changed my mind,” he said as he started walking straight towards Zoro. “I’ll fight you.”

 

Zoro pursed his eyebrows.“Are you fucking kidding—”

 

But before he could finish, Sanji was already lunging at him, fist aimed squarely at his face.And he was pretty fucking fast.

 

Zoro knew right away that if he'd taken that punch head-on, he would've probably staggered away with a broken nose.But his reflexes were pretty goddamn good, so he dodged.Just barely.And then he ducked down and stepped back, because Sanji wasn't finished.

 

“What the fuck is wrong with you?!” Zoro shouted at him.

 

Zoro took on a defensive pose, holding his fists in front of him.He wasn't actually wearing boxing gloves, though, so there was only so much he was going to be able to block.  

 

And Sanji came at him again so fast, with such an intense look on his face, that it made Zoro hesitate.He avoided the hit—and then he tried to hit him back.But Sanji was quick, and he dodged, too.

 

Sanji was all over the place, but his wild, formless punches came quick and hard, and Zoro was getting knocked around by quite a few of them.Not to mention that he wasn't just punching.Fists, feet—even goddamn elbows and knees were fair game to him, apparently.

 

Zoro landed a sharp punch right on Sanji's collar bone—and that should've fucking _hurt._ But Sanji didn't even flinch.Instead, he threw his weight forward, knocking Zoro back a little bit, and as Zoro took a single stumbling step backwards, Sanji reached out and grabbed him again, grabbed him by his fucking _shirt_ , and he yanked him forward and planted a knee right in Zoro’s gut.

 

Zoro realized that Sanji might've been in quite a few fights before.

 

And that was exactly what the two of them were doing right now—fighting.Not boxing.Which meant there was no real way for Zoro to “win” this match.  

 

Sanji fought like a kid cornered on the playground.Like he didn't give a shit about what happened to him as long as he could claw his way out of there.

 

“Come on, you've been _training_ every goddamn day,” Sanji shouted, pausing briefly as an uppercut just barely knocked him by the tip of his chin, his teeth clacking together loudly.“Is this the best you can do!”

 

Zoro knocked his jaw with a left hook, which probably rattled his teeth a little, but Sanji didn't back off to recover.Instead, he wrapped an arm around Zoro’s neck and held him in a headlock as he threw a tight fist into that center spot right under his ribcage. 

 

This time, Sanji actually knocked the wind out of him for a second.  

 

But fine.Sanji wasn't boxing, so neither would he.

 

Twisting around and latching onto Sanji’s shoulders, Zoro kicked at him, and he didn’t hold back—he _stomped_ on Sanji’s shin, and then his thigh—and he grabbed onto Sanji’s shoulders, trying to punch him in the gut and the ribs over and over again. Fucking nailed him a few times, too.

 

As Sanji coughed real hard and took a step back, Zoro reached out and got an arm around his neck, succeeded in getting him in a tight headlock, and he punched him so goddamn hard, until Sanji wedged his fucking hand up against Zoro’s face, shoving and pushing against Zoro’s nose and his eyes until he finally had to let go because _fuck—_ and then, without missing a beat, Sanji grabbed him by his fucking _hair_ , and he pulled him _hard_ , jerking him forward, and Sanji returned the headlock. Rather than punching at him, though, he pulled Zoro in close to his body and turned and wrenched him around to the side, using Zoro’s own weight against him—and they both toppled to the ground together. Shit.

 

As soon as they hit the ground, the side of Sanji's fist smacked him on his goddamn ear, making his earrings jingle a little.Or maybe his ears were ringing.It was hard to say.

 

He was at a disadvantage here—he had to get up.But every time he tried to get to his feet, Sanji pulled him back down.Grabbed him by the shirt, kicked at the back of his knee, whatever it took to keep him from standing.Zoro tried to punch and kick back at him.He'd been in a couple fights before, but it'd been a long time.He wasn’t used to the way things worked when rules no longer applied.

 

The struggle ended suddenly.

 

With a shout, cursing at him in a short slew of words Zoro couldn’t even register, Sanji suddenly twisted his body around, throwing himself on top of Zoro, and in a quick movement, he managed to straddle Zoro’s chest and dig his knees into the insides of Zoro’s elbows, effectively trapping both his arms and pinning him down. 

 

Zoro could smell smoke and ashes and burnt tobacco, and when he glanced over, he could see the stomped out cigarette Sanji had put out just minutes ago about a foot away from his head.

 

Zoro tried to wriggle free but Sanji fucking had him.

 

With one hand against Zoro’s chest, fingers against the base of his throat, Sanji pulled back his other hand and clenched it into a fist. And as he did that, his face contorted into an awful expression.He looked kind of fucking miserable.  

 

Zoro couldn't look away, even as Sanji swung.He gritted his teeth together and closed his eyes at the last second, bracing himself.

 

But Sanji stopped it at the last possible moment.His fist barely even tapped Zoro’s nose, and it stayed there for a few long seconds.

 

Zoro opened his eyes and looked up at him.

 

Sanji's eyes widened, blond hair falling in front of his face as he stared at Zoro, breathing heavily and seemingly frozen in place.

 

For a second, Zoro forgot to move, too.

 

It wasn't until Sanji finally backed away, rolling off of him and flopping onto his back, that Zoro sprang into action.Practically jumping to his feet, he rushed to the front door of the Sunny, hurrying inside and up to the second story.He didn't know why he was hurrying.

 

Grabbing a change of clothes from his room, he headed into the shower, tonguing at a split in his lip.Sanji had bet that he wouldn't be able to land a single hit, but he'd landed a hell of a lot.Looking at his face in the mirror, Zoro could see that Sanji'd landed a hell of a lot on him, too.

 

None of them were that bad—except the last one.If Sanji had gone through with it, he might've had a hard time even getting back up.

 

Zoro turned on the shower and stepped inside without for it to warm up.He tried not to think about how damn cold the water was.And he tried not to think about the look on Sanji's face when he pulled that fucking punch.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

“I want coffee. And pizza.” 

 

“Gross.” 

 

Usopp walked with Nami down one Sabaody’s many wide hallways, dragging his feet. He was about to start dragging his backpack, too, because that fucker was heavy and his shoulders felt like they were going to snap off. 

 

Nami gave him the most ridiculous face. 

 

“How can you _say_ that?” she asked. 

 

“Coffee and pizza mixed together sounds disgusting?”

 

“Well **—** I don’t want to mix them _together_ , numbnuts.” 

 

“That’s fair, I guess,” Usopp replied, his hands around the straps of his bag. 

 

“Let’s go get coffee. And then later after that, pizza.”

 

“But imagine coffee-flavored pizza.” 

 

“Usopp, that is _fucked up._ ” 

 

He grinned as he kept walking, shifting his backpack again. They had a good routine on Fridays. They both had classes that let out at about the same time, so they always rode home together, and they usually ended up hanging out for the rest of the day until it was time for their shift at their second job to start. 

 

Usopp didn’t really know what to call the fact that he and Nami had actually fallen into a very regular routine that involved walking around the city and stealing cars, so in his head, he’d just started calling it their second job, because that honestly was what it felt like at that point. It sure as hell still made him sick to his stomach on the drive down there, but after they got to work and into their rhythm, the anxiety started to fade. 

 

He was actually getting used to it, over time. The whole driving off in stolen cars thing. It was getting easier, almost. They were getting pretty goddamn good at it, too, in his opinion. Learning as they went. And it felt like they were in the home stretch. Nami had told him it wouldn’t be too much longer and they could be finished forever, and they could put it all behind them, and _that_ would feel incredible when the time came, Usopp was sure of it. 

 

“What kind of pizza are you going to get?” he asked her idly as they walked along. He didn’t have to ask where she wanted to go—she had one particular place that she liked, so that was where they’d be going. 

 

“Pineapple,” Nami answered. 

 

“Ew.”

 

“And bacon,” she added. 

 

“You mean Canadian bacon, right?” Usopp clarified. 

 

“Sick, no, I mean real actual bacon,” Nami replied.

 

“That’s... disgusting.” 

 

“It’s literally a perfect combination.” 

 

“There are certain things you shouldn’t put on pizza,” Usopp pointed out. “And also, there are things you shouldn’t _mix together_ , eugh.”

 

“You’re so boring.” 

 

“I like to think of myself as a traditionalist.”

 

They pushed each of the two heavy main entrance doors of the Science and Technology building open and stepped outside together. The late-afternoon weather was nice, for the end of February. It wasn’t so bad in the direct sunlight. 

 

“So what’s your favorite topping, then?” Nami asked as they matched strides, heading for his car that he’d left in the south parking lot. 

 

“I’unno. Pepperoni never did anyone wrong.” 

 

Nami snorted. “Pepperoni is like the Budweiser of pizza toppings.” 

 

“Hey,” he frowned. “It is not. It is a distinguished topping. It’s a _strong_ topping.” 

 

“It’s the Bud Light of toppings. It’s the ranch dressing of pizza.” 

 

“Alright, but I _will_ dip pizza in ranch dressing if it’s covered in hot sauce.”

 

“Now we’re talking,” she grinned at him. 

 

“Did you know buffalo chicken pizza is a thing?” Usopp asked as they walked the winding concrete path that led through a cluster of big trees and out to the parking lot. 

 

“Fuck, no,” she breathed, looking over at him. “I hadn’t even considered the possibility.” 

 

“It exists,” he confirmed. “There was a pizza place in the city that had it, I used to get it all the time when I was in high school. They had all kinds of weird pizzas. Like macaroni pizza. And breakfast pizza, like they’d put sausage and eggs and bacon on it. And taco pizza. They had dessert pizzas, too.” 

 

“Let’s _go there_ ,” Nami said. “Let’s go there tonight.” 

 

“They won’t be open when we’re there,” he replied, remembering the place. Back in high school, anytime they got let out early, like when he had a half-day, he’d always wind up there. “They’ll be closed by the time we get to the city.” 

 

“Then let’s hang around until they open back up. Tomorrow’s Saturday, we can kill some time and get it for breakfast before we come back.” 

 

“Hell no, unless you drive my ass back home because I will fall asleep at the wheel, and we will wreck and die a fiery death.” 

 

“First of all,” she said, holding up a single finger as they strolled along, “cars do not catch on fire that easily. Your car would most likely not actually burn once we crash and burn—“

 

“I _know that_ —“

 

“And second!” She held up another finger, “You got a deal. I will totally drive us back.” 

 

“Ugh, no,” he groaned, rubbing his eyes. “I wasn’t serious, they don’t open until, like, ten.”

 

“This is your fault for telling me about buffalo chicken pizza.” 

 

Usopp huffed a little. 

 

“I _really want_ to try buffalo chicken pizza, Usopp,” Nami said in a very serious and threatening tone. Although, when he looked over at her, she was smiling. 

 

“It’s not even that good,” he said. 

 

“This coming from someone who doesn’t understand that pineapple bacon pizza is one of the most superior pizzas of all time. Listen, alright—you and I are going to get delicious buffalo chicken pizza, and it’s going to be amazing, and I’m going to eat an obscene amount of it at ten in the morning.” 

 

“No,” was his simple reply, but in all reality, he wouldn’t be surprised if that was exactly what they ended up doing. Nami was spontaneous like that, and she usually followed through once she set her mind on something. And she was also really goddamn good at convincing him to do things. 

 

“Coffee first, though,” she said, re-shouldering her bag. 

 

“Agreed,” he sighed, because he was obviously going to fucking need it. 

 

They approached the end of the concrete path to where it opened up to the parking lot. There were still a lot of cars in the lot despite the fact that the sun was about to start setting. Usopp’s station wagon was parked more towards the rear of the lot—he’d been a little late and couldn’t find a good spot. 

 

“Do you want cheap shitty coffee or delicious super-overpriced coffee?” he asked as they walked past rows of cars. 

 

“I want the fancy stuff. It’s Friday. I feel like we deserve some fancy bullshit.” 

 

“We could also potentially get Sanji to make some for us,” Usopp added.

 

“He’s probably at work already.” 

 

“Oh yeah. Well, whatever. Fancy it is, then. But I feel like it’s not as good as you think it is.” 

 

She wrinkled her nose at him. “Okay, well, I feel like your tastebuds are broken or just really stupid.” 

 

“This coming from the girl who eats pickles by the jar and...” he trailed off, squinting towards where his car was parked. Was there someone sitting on the hood?

 

“And what? Pickles are incredible.” She paused when he didn’t say anything. He actually forgot to speak, for a quick moment. “Hello? Usopp—“

 

“There’s someone on my car.” 

 

She followed his eyes and they both stopped walking. 

 

“Oh,” she said quietly. “There is.” 

 

There was a guy—a man, a really big man with dark hair sitting right on the hood of his car, looking directly at them. 

 

“What the fuck. Do you know him?” she asked. 

 

“No.” 

 

They both stood there, staring back at the stranger. Neither one of them spoke for a few seconds. 

 

“Well...” Nami broke their short silence, “I guess let’s... see what he wants.” 

 

As they took the first few slow steps towards him, Usopp’s heart was starting to pound, and he couldn’t really explain why. Maybe it was the way this guy was looking right at them, like he _knew_ them. Like he knew that was Usopp’s car he was sitting on. Like he was waiting for them. 

 

As they got closer, the man’s features became more visible and distinct. His hair was slicked back, and he wore a really big coat with a fur collar—probably what made him look so huge in the first place. When they were almost to him, Usopp saw that he had a long, dark scar going directly across his face, stretching across his nose and connecting both his cheekbones. 

 

There was a strict rule about how there was no tobacco allowed on the Sabaody campus. The man lit a cigar as they approached. 

 

“Uh, hi,” Usopp said, clearing his throat, trying to steady his voice and having a hard time looking the man directly in the eye. He didn’t know why the hell he felt like this.

 

“Can we help you?” Nami added, sounding _way_ more confident than Usopp ever could. 

 

“Yes, you can, actually!” The man smiled at them, puffing on his cigar a few times. It smelled awful. Way worse than Sanji’s cigarettes. 

 

They both waited for him to continue. 

 

“I was hoping you could give me a ride,” the man said, still with that smile. 

 

Neither one of them really had any words. Although the man didn’t give them much time to respond. 

 

“You see,” he continued, tapping his cigar and watching the ash fall onto the hood of Usopp’s car before looking back up at them, “the other night, I ran into some bad luck, and it turns out my car was stolen.” 

 

Usopp felt his stomach and his entire world plummet. 

 

“Right off the street! Can you believe that? I leave it for a few hours and _poof_ , just like that—“ he waved his hand through the air a little, “Gone.” 

 

Unable to breathe, Usopp glanced very quickly over at Nami, and the look on her face didn’t make him feel any better. Her expression was controlled, but her eyes were just as wide open as his own. 

 

“I did what I could to recover it, but by the time I’d located the poor thing, it’d already been run through a chop shop.” The man’s voice dropped a bit lower. “And you know, it’s a shame. I _really liked_ that car. A _lot._ ” 

 

For several seconds, silence passed between the three of them, with the man giving them a very serious look now, no longer smiling, and Usopp and Nami were both frozen in their spots. The air around them was getting colder as the sun was starting to go down. A harsh breeze whipped through the lot, and the smell of the smoke from the cigar that rushed past his face almost made Usopp gag. 

 

“So,” the man said, his voice very level. “Usopp. Nami.” 

 

Usopp felt his throat tighten and his palms starting to sweat and his heart starting to kick the fuck out of his chest and the blood in his veins rushing through his entire body and his pulse pounding through his ears and in his brain and in the backs of his eyes. 

 

He knew their names. He know both of their names. He looked right at each one of them as he said them. He _knew their names._

 

“Would you mind giving me a ride?”  

 

He knew their names and he knew that was Usopp’s car that he was sitting on and he knew _everything._

 

Usopp opened his mouth to speak, but words sure as hell weren’t coming. He couldn’t make a single sound.

The man slid from the hood of the car and stood in front of them, and he was _significantly_ taller than both of them, and he looked down at them— _glared_ down at both of them—as he said, “Unlock the doors and get in the car.” 

 

Usopp couldn’t move. He physically could not will his limbs to move until Nami elbowed him in the side, and then they sprang into action, and Usopp unlocked the front and back doors, and he and Nami slid in their usual spots in the front seats while the man let himself into the back next to where they put their bags. 

 

Once all the doors were closed and Usopp found himself sitting behind the steering wheel of his car, like his legs had moved on their own and now he was suddenly _there_ , trying not to visibly shake, nobody said anything for a couple seconds. 

 

And then the man’s voice cut through the silence as he said, “You can start driving now.” 

 

Usopp tried to steady his breath as he said, “Uh, wh... where—“

 

“You can head towards your home. 20 Thriller Bark Lane, isn’t it? That old haggard looking mess of a house. I don’t see how you two can live in a place like that, but who am I to judge.” 

 

Despite the casual tone of the man’s voice, Usopp was about to start screaming. It felt like there was a marble in his throat. Or a bowling ball, whichever, he could barely goddamn breathe. He glanced over at Nami, his heart still beating in overdrive, and she looked back at him with the widest, most terrified eyes, and that was about the moment that Usopp started to lose whatever tiny bit of security he had left to cling to. 

 

She didn’t know what to do, either. 

 

He couldn’t move again. 

 

The man leaned forward from the back seat and Usopp nearly jumped out of his own. 

 

“Start the car. Drive to 20 Thriller Bark Lane. Do not make this difficult.” 

 

The man’s voice was so clear and cutting. Usopp was fucking sweating. He wanted to yank his coat off. He felt like he was about to pass out. 

 

“Usopp, drive,” Nami whispered, and with that, he blinked, started his car, shifted into reverse, backed out of the spot, and started driving towards their home. 

 

Once they pulled out of the parking lot, the man started speaking again, but neither Nami or Usopp turned to look back at him. Both of them stared straight ahead through the windshield. 

 

“You both probably have a lot of questions,” the man said. 

 

Usopp actually didn’t have a single question. He couldn’t think enough to form questions. He could barely accept what was currently happening at the moment.

 

His car was going to smell like cigars. 

 

“The both of you may call me Crocodile,” he went on. 

 

What the fuck kind of name was that. 

 

Usopp nearly sputtered out choked laughter because that was the only clear thought he could work through his crumbling brain at the moment. He felt like he was short-circuiting. 

 

The man kept talking. Usopp could feel the smoke from the cigar was starting to choke him.

 

“And I should preface this conversation immediately with informing you that your previous... employer? Acquaintance? Whatever you want to call him—Arlong met with an unfortunate accident, I’m sorry to say.” 

 

Who the fuck was Arlong? 

 

Usopp glanced at Nami again, and she was squeezing her hands around the fabric of her pants, the heels of her palms digging into her thighs. He could see the quickening rise and fall of her chest. 

 

Arlong must’ve been who she’d been paying—that was the only thing that made any sense. Thousands and thousands of dollars all to one man, and Usopp had never even bothered to ask his name. Well, he’d assumed it wasn’t important to know his name. And it clearly wasn’t important anymore. 

 

Because Arlong had apparently met with some kind of unfortunate accident. Which meant... 

 

Usopp looked over at Nami again, and the way her mouth was clamped shut. 

 

Holy fucking shit, Arlong was dead, wasn’t he. 

 

“However! I do have some news for the both of you in light of all that—some _good_ news. Very good news for you both. Both of you are very lucky,” Crocodile said, snapping Usopp back to the present moment. 

 

The music in his car was turned down all the way, so Usopp could hear everything quite clearly. He could hear the shifting and rustling of fabric, that heavy coat Crocodile was wearing being moved around, and he could hear a metallic click, and he could hear the smile in Crocodile’s words. 

 

Usopp’s mind rewound back to the clicking noise. It was a sound he recognized, but, he realized, one he had never heard in person. Only on television and in movies. 

 

There was movement out of the corner of his eye, and Usopp turned his head just a bit to see Crocodile press the end of a gun with the safety lowered against the back of Nami’s shoulder. 

 

Usopp nearly slammed on the fucking brakes, and he sucked in the deepest breath, and he started to turn in his seat, to do something, he wasn’t sure what, but he heard Nami say very quietly—

 

“Keep driving. Just keep driving.” 

 

His grip tightened around the steering wheel. 

 

Holy fuck. Holy shit, holy fucking shit. Jesus Christ.  

 

Crocodile laughed from the back seat. 

 

In that moment, in those few seconds passing by him slower than time really actually passed, Usopp had never been more terrified in his entire fucking life. Nothing could compare.

 

“Nami is clearly the brains of this operation, isn’t she,” Crocodile said through his slow and deep laughter. He tapped his cigar again, letting ash fall to the seat.  

 

Neither of them responded. 

 

“I thought it was just her at first, to be honest. It made more sense once I found out about you, Usopp. Which didn’t take too terribly long. But no, I like this setup you have going. Romantic, in a way.”

 

Usopp almost told him that she wasn’t his girlfriend. But what the fuck was the point of that. And he couldn’t speak if he wanted to, anyway.

 

“Anyway, both of you can calm down,“—how the fuck was he supposed to calm the fuck down—“because, like I said, I have good news for you both.” 

 

Usopp hated how Crocodile would pause, as if they were actually going to say something in response. Just get on with it. Just say the fucking words. 

 

He spoke so slowly. Like he was goddamn oozing.

 

“I’m an entrepreneur. A man of seizing and, likewise, offering opportunities when they come along. And, to be frank—I want to make this quick, being that you both live so close by—you’re worth more to me alive than not, simply put. Seeing that my very recent acquisition of Arlong’s business has put me in this position of taking over his capital and thus the responsibilities attached to it, I considered my options while considering the books, and—Usopp, Nami, I have to say, you are both talented young individuals. Or at least, very ambitious and lucky.” 

 

Usopp hardly heard a single fucking word because Crocodile’s finger was still on the goddamn trigger, resting right fucking on it.

 

What did Crocodile say? Entrepreneur shit, business acquisition, capital... talented individuals, what the fuck—

 

“So what I’m saying is, actually, nothing much will really change for you,” Crocodile said. “All in all, you will now be paying your debt back to _me_ , after you reimburse my car. So... this is actually _great_ news for you both.” 

 

“So you’re not going to kill us,” Nami said, her voice cracking for the first time Usopp had ever witnessed. 

 

The smoke from Crocodile’s cigar was actually choking him. He was going to get sick.

 

“As you're most likely aware, the debt you’re paying is worth more than the land itself.It'd be far more advantageous for me to let you pay off the loan.”

 

Nami stared down at her lap, and Usopp looked back at the road. 

 

“Really?” Nami asked, her voice so quiet. 

 

“Yes,” Crocodile replied. “I’m not a _monster_. I believe in good business ethics! However—if you _cross me_ ,” he said, lowering his voice, and he pushed the end of the gun so hard against the back of Nami’s shoulder that she rocked forward in her seat with the force of the movement, “I will see to it that you regret it. That your sister regrets it. I will see to it that your roommates regret it. I will see to it that _their_ families regret it.” 

 

Usopp almost gagged. He was about to start dry-heaving. He could feel that burning pressure behind his eyes and in his sinuses. God, he couldn’t cry in this moment. Not now. 

 

“We won’t,” Nami said, her voice firm. “We won’t fuck around.”

 

“Good! I believe you! You’ve done very well so far.” 

 

Crocodile sounded like he was fucking proud of them. 

 

“So, Usopp, Nami, that’s all there is to it, really. I’ll be in contact with you—I already have both of your phone numbers.”He tapped the barrel of the gun against Nami’s shoulder, like he was reassuring them, before withdrawing and tucking it back in his coat. He took a deep breath, and Usopp could see Crocodile smiling back at him through the rearview mirror. “Until then, you may continue on with business as usual.” 

 

There was an intensely thick silence that washed over them. 

 

“And, great timing—you can pull over right here—“ they were turning onto the street where the Thousand Sunny was located, “—these are my associates, you can stop in front of this car.” 

 

Usopp rolled his old station wagon to a stop in front of a black four-door sedan. Crocodile climbed out of the car as he assured them that they’d be hearing from him soon, his expression smug around his fucking cigar. He closed the door, and another man in a suit opened the back door of the black sedan, and Crocodile slid inside.

 

Usopp and Nami watched for a few seconds before they looked straight ahead again. 

 

“Just... Just get us home. We’re almost there, let’s just get home first,” Nami said, her voice fucking shaking as the other car drove away. 

 

It was over. 

 

Usopp could feel tears stinging at his eyes, and he kept blinking them away, sniffing once really loudly and taking the deepest breath he could. His legs were shaking so badly that he could barely work the pedals under his shoes. 

 

He killed the engine when he tried to shift from neutral to first. He hadn’t done that since he was, fuck, sixteen years old. 

 

After a slight pause and another slight shudder as he tried not to break down and start fucking crying in front of Nami, he restarted his car and drove down the remaining couple blocks to the Sunny. 

 

Once they were parked in front of the house and the engine was off and the emergency brake was engaged, they both sat there in Usopp’s car in complete silence, both of them staring blankly ahead. 

 

After maybe an entire full minute of nothing, finally, Usopp said, “I think I’m going to throw up.” 

 

“Don’t do it in the car,” Nami mumbled. 

 

“We can’t do this. We need to think of something.” 

 

Nami looked over at him, and she hugged her arms around herself, and he could see her shaking just as much as he still was. The adrenaline was wrecking them both. They’d gone through this before—dealing with the aftereffects of adrenaline overload together—but never... never anything to this level of intensity. Neither of them could speak very well. Their voices kept cracking, unsteady as hell. 

 

“Do you have any ideas?” Nami asked. 

 

“I...” Usopp started to say, even though he couldn’t think of anything, and he was having such a difficult time breathing correctly that he felt like he couldn’t suck in enough air to even form a complete sentence, and he felt like he was maybe about to pass out. He swallowed, rubbing his sweaty palms together slowly as he said, “I don’t know what to do.” 

 

“He knows everything,” Nami said, her voice so quiet. 

 

“We are super fucked,” Usopp agreed, rubbing his palms together _harder._ “We are so goddamn fucked.” 

 

“We don’t know anything about him,” Nami added. “Just his stupid idiot fucker mafia name.” 

 

Usopp recognized that this would’ve been a moment when he would smile, but his face felt numb. 

 

“His name was so fucking stupid,” he said. “Is he in the mafia? Was that a mafia thing?” 

 

“Cartel, maybe. Who knows. I don’t know. I can’t believe that just fucking happened,” she said, almost whispering, almost choking on her words. 

 

After a few more seconds of soaking in the events that’d just passed between them, Usopp asked, “What are we going to do?” 

 

Nami shook her head slowly. “I don’t know. Nothing. Keep going. There’s nothing else we can do, is there.” 

 

“We have to do _something—“_

 

“Like what? You keep saying that, like we have all these _options._ But I can’t think of any. Can you?” 

 

“Nami, he had a _gun pressed against you—“_

 

“I fucking know he did!” she shouted suddenly, turning towards him. “I was there! It just happened! So you don’t have to fucking tell me what went on. I was there when he did that, and when he said he killed Arlong, and when he said he’d fuck up my sister and our roommates if we dicked around! Remember that part!” 

 

Usopp opened his mouth to speak, but he didn’t have anything good to say, so he said nothing at all. 

 

His eyes fell to his own lap, popping his knuckles and wringing his hands together. He still wanted to cry. 

 

After a beat, Nami said, “He told us everything was... Remember, he said nothing really changed for us. We just have to pay him now. So...” 

 

“No,” Usopp cut in, “See, okay, _this_ is the moment where it’s like, okay, this is where we need to go to the police or tell someone or move to Mexico or something. This is the red flag. I mean, stealing cars was also a red flag, I guess, but this is _the_ red flag.” 

 

“What if he hurts them, though?” Nami asked, and her voice sounded so goddamn fragile and unlike her. “This is why I went along with it in the first place. Because I couldn’t risk anyone else getting hurt, or worse. And now... it’s even _worse_ now than it was before. I can’t let... Usopp, I’ve already put _you_ in so much danger, you have no idea how I feel—“ 

 

“Don’t,” Usopp interrupted, because he couldn’t stand to hear it. “Just... Okay.” 

 

“Okay?” 

 

“Yeah, whatever, okay. You’re right.” 

 

Usopp looked at the Sunny. He stared at the stupid lion he’d painted while he was drunk that everyone loved for some reason. He knew Nami was waiting for him to say something else, because he’d given in too suddenly, but really—he didn’t know what the fuck else to argue with, and he couldn’t change anything in their situation in that moment, so it was easier to just... give in. 

 

There wasn’t a whole lot else he could do. It was easier to be with her than against her. It didn’t matter what he said in that moment, and he couldn’t fight her anymore.

 

“I’m sorry, Usopp,” she said, almost whispering. 

 

“Don’t be. Nothing here is your fault.”

 

“I got you into this,” she added, sounding so goddamn pained. 

 

“I’m glad you did,” he said, and his voice was firm that time. It didn’t crack at all. “You can’t do this shit alone. Nobody could.”

 

He’d wind up following her anywhere. 

 

She rubbed at her eyes and wouldn’t look at him. 

 

“It’ll be okay. We can do this,” he said, finding some kind of fake confidence to back his words. 

 

Nami sniffed and nodded. “Right. Yeah. Okay, you’re right. We got this.” 

 

Such bullshit. But what else could they do. What else could they say.

 

Nami glanced up at him, looking so defeated. “Let’s still get buffalo chicken pizza, though.” 

 

Usopp actually snorted, his whole body feeling so shaky and unsteady, and laughing felt unreal, but in that moment, everything felt unreal, so he laughed anyway. 

 

“Okay,” he said. “Ten in the morning, as soon as they open, we’ll be there.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hell yea hell yea thanks for reading february, thanks for reading thus far as always, thanks for your support and comments and reviews and ALLLLL THAT ALRIGHT THAT IS OUR SHIT!!!!! THANK YOU! IT REALLY MAKES SUCH A HUGE DIFFERENCE UGGHHGH okay okay calm. anyway, pls excuse the wait on this chapter as things were pretty busy for both of us. but we’re back on track now, and we feel that you’ll really enjoy the next chapter when it comes!!! and if you enjoyed the thing thus far, let us know, bc we love that alright we love it.


	10. March

For boxers, records were everything.And right now, Zoro was at 2 wins, 0 losses, 2 KO's.  

 

It kind of made him want to grin.Although, since it was just underground boxing, those stats were worthless.But it was good to have something that made him feel like he was more than just a fucking failure.

 

Plus, with the winnings from his match, he could pay rent.Once that stupid toy store had stopped putting him on the schedule, he'd applied to so many places.Any shitty, minimum wage shit-hole he could think of.But it had still taken him over a month to find a new job.  

 

It was another late night shift, working at a convenience store right next to campus.Really close to the Sunny, too, so at least that was easy.No bus rides.He'd just started last week, so it'd be at least another week before he got his first paycheck.

 

Twenty-some hours a week at minimum wage. Like that would be enough money to scrape by on.But, Zoro would keep boxing, too.Hell, he'd made more winning one fight than he'd make working there for a month, probably.

 

Too bad those fights didn't happen very often.If boxing was all Zoro had to do—it would be nice.

 

School was just as bad as it'd always been.Maybe worse.But maybe it couldn't get any worse.

 

Tonight, Zoro probably wouldn't be sleeping.He had to study for a test.Because what else did he ever do.

 

Managerial Economics.Bullshit sounding class.Zoro hadn't really known what it was about when he'd signed up, but it was on the list of courses he _had_ to take to graduate, so it wasn't like it mattered.His only choice was to struggle through it.

 

It was somehow even shittier than it sounded, too.The only reason he was hanging on with a D grade point average was that he'd been trying to study the same way Sanji had shown him.And he fucking _hated_ that he had to rely on that.Because instead of studying, he'd wind up thinking about that idiot.How they'd spent so much time together at the end of last semester.How he'd stupidly thought they were getting along.How wrong he'd been.

 

And the fucking strained look on Sanji's face as he leaned over Zoro.The feeling of Sanji's knuckles on the tip of his nose.  

 

Fuck.He needed to focus.

 

He'd spent most of the day alternating between studying and training—endurance, stamina, strength. 

 

But it got late, and Zoro ran out of distractions, and all there was left to do was sit at his desk, hunched over a mess of papers until his goddamn back hurt.

 

By four in the morning, he could barely keep his eyes open.After nodding off for the fifth or so time, he gave up.Turned off his light and fell onto his bed, not even bothering to peel back the blankets.  

 

He should've fallen asleep immediately.But his mind kept wandering.

 

He didn't feel good about the test tomorrow.Not that he ever really did.But it weighed down on his chest and made him feel like it was hard to breath.

 

For nearly four years, he'd been doing this shit.And he was so sick and goddamn tired of the same old routine.  

 

At first, he'd thought he could do it.Get his degree.Graduate.Land a decent job.But every semester, it felt more and more impossible, as the classes got harder and he didn't get any smarter.He sure as hell didn't feel like he was _learning_ from all of the education he was getting.

 

Zoro still didn't know what angel and venture capital financing really was, or what it meant to be thinking on the margin, or the difference between a discounted cash flow analysis and a market approach.He memorized definitions and scenarios, but he didn't get anything out of it.Didn't make him feel any closer to his goal.

 

Business classes didn't made sense—but the feeling of the weight behind his fist did.

 

For the second time that day, he found himself thinking about boxing for a living.

 

Hah.A pro-boxer.What a thought.Then all his shitty test grades and all the shit he didn't understand wouldn't matter.The only thing he'd be judged on would be his strength, speed and reflexes.Things he was actually confident about.  

 

And hell, it wasn't impossible.If he was good enough, he could actually make a decent living.And with a steady income stream, if he planned it right, he could still keep his promise—

 

A wave of nausea gathered in his stomach as his eyes snapped open.He stared up at the ceiling tiles that were barely visible in the darkness as his heart thumped against his ribs.

 

Shit.

 

He shouldn't even think about it.About being a boxer.Because his career was supposed to be safe and reliable and _secure_.And an athletic career was the opposite of that.One stupid injury and it was all over, instantly.  

 

Although, if his body didn't break, and he kept on winning—and if he did the right things with the money he made—  

 

He sat up and rubbed his eyes before wiping away the sweat beading along his brow. 

 

Zoro was thinking about the past now.And the promise.

 

He hated remembering his shitty fucking past.When they were just twelve years old.A bunch of goddamn helpless babies.But no matter how many times Zoro tried to reject the memory, it was always teetering at the edge of his mind.

 

He remembered the bile rising at the back of his throat.The taste of blood as he tongued at the fresh hole in his gums.He wasn't even sure what'd happened to the tooth that'd been knocked out.Swallowed or something, maybe.His ribs hurt like hell—bruised or broken.But he didn't care about any of that.His injuries didn't matter, because _she_ was even worse off.  

 

Kuina's eye was already turning black and purple, swelling shut, and she had a huge split in her lips, right by the corner of her mouth.Her hair and her clothes—dirty and fucking torn up—made it look like she'd just crawled out of a car wreck.  

 

But it sure as hell wasn't a goddamn car that'd done all that.

 

The world was so fucked up back then.That foster home was a living hell, but they were only kids, and they didn't have any choice or say in what happened with their lives.They were completely and totally reliant on their fucked up caretakers.

 

There was no way to run away.Maybe if they'd been born a hundred years earlier, they could've pulled it off.But nowadays, there was no way for two kids to stay under the radar for long.They'd get picked up by cops or some self-righteous good samaritan who'd return them to their so-called home.

 

They'd tried and failed twice before they stopped trying altogether.Wasn't worth the welcome home they got.

 

Six years until they'd be adults.It might as well have been a million.Besides, it wasn't like it'd end there.Zoro and Kuina were all too aware of the cycle they were stuck in.Most people never broke out of it, so how the hell could they hope to be any different.

 

He was barely old enough to understand what a social class was, but he knew he was trapped in it.They'd be purged out of the system the minute they turned eighteen, but it probably wouldn't be long until they got sucked back in.  

 

They'd never have a real future.Never be able to afford anything substantial, or provide for themselves, or their families, if they ever had one.They'd live a life where they'd go totally without, and have to be dependent on others, whether it was on other people or the system.  

 

He and Kuina were only dumb kids, but there were some things they just _understood._

 

So that night, after they'd both had the hell beat out of them, they made a new plan.They were sick of this life that they'd never chosen for themselves. So they were going to break out of it.Pick their own future.

 

Kuina looked like she could barely move, but somehow, she'd managed to smile and stand up straight as she linked her pinky with Zoro's, sealing the agreement they'd just made. 

 

They would wrench themselves out of this cycle.They'd get the fuck out.

 

_It's a promise._

 

Her words still sounded crisp and real in his memory, like she'd just fucking said it.Zoro sucked in a ragged breath and opened his eyes.

 

As much as he'd been trying to avoid thinking about her, it was no wonder he was failing.Grabbing his phone from the bedside table, he pressed the button that turned the screen on.It made the room glow a little.  

 

He knew the date he was going to see, but it still make his stomach feel heavy.March 4th.Today, it'd been ten years since Kuina died.  

 

A whole fucking decade.  

 

Turning his phone off, he tossed it onto the bed and leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees and dipping his head down.The way his brain worked was so stupid.Zoro had never been able to remember birthdays or holidays for shit, but this was a date that'd probably be burned into his mind forever.

 

It hadn't even been a year after they'd made that promise that Kuina had died.And after she was gone, their promise was the only thing that really kept him going.  

 

It was all he'd ever had.

 

Hell, it was all _they'd_ ever had.And when she died, probably no one else really gave a shit.Zoro was the only one who could do anything for her.He had to make something of himself for both of them.He had to break out of the system. He couldn't wind up falling back into fucking poverty.

 

Because there was nothing else left of Kuina in this world, except the promise they'd made late one night when they were twelve.

 

Zoro had thought about it endlessly.When most of the dumbass kids around him were thinking about getting drunk or laid, Zoro was thinking about his plan.His fucking life.Obsessing over what the fuck he could do. 

 

And somewhere along the way, he'd decided college was his best shot.Because with the right degree, he could get a job that was actually enough to sustain somebody.A job with benefits and a pension and a 401(k).A wage that wouldn't force him to live paycheck to paycheck—wouldn't make him go into debt every time he had a cavity or a flat tire.

 

So Zoro laid out his plan, and he'd done everything he could to stay on that path.Even if he'd been struggling every fucking day.  

 

It was goddamn awful, but he'd never even considered quitting.This wasn't just for him—it was for both of them.It was the only thing he could do for Kuina now.

 

College hadn't been part of their promise—but it'd seemed like the most sure-fire way to do what he needed to.But, fuck, that wasn't really panning out.  

 

Zoro wondered if he was even capable of graduating.

 

He put his head between his knees and threaded his fingers along the back of his head, fighting back another wave of nausea.  

 

If he boxed for a living—if he was good... shit could work out.Even though Zoro didn't understand a lot of the business shit he'd learned about, he knew there were some things he'd need to do.Get a retirement account.Make investments.Something to get whatever money he made grow.Buy shit that'd, uh, appreciate in value.Like a house.Instead of flashy shit like cars and big TVs.

 

If Zoro became a boxer—maybe shit really _could_ work out.

 

Maybe it wasn't impossible.

 

The more he thought about it, the less sense any of it made, and his head was starting to throb a little.He didn't have a clue about what was right or wrong.Hell, maybe _all_ of it was wrong.  

 

He thought about Kuina, and what they'd decided for themselves as children.He thought about all the shit he used to believe so deeply.He wondered what the hell happened to all that conviction he used to have.

 

He gnawed at his bottom lip as he thought about what Kuina would've done, if she was there now.If she could've pointed him in the right direction.If she would have told him to do what he wanted to do.He thought about what Kuina would've said about where he was now, and what she would've thought about all the people that'd filled his life.He thought about Sanji.

 

And when he was too sick of the sound of his own voice in his head, he reluctantly got up and sat down at his desk.Because even if he didn't know what direction he was going in, he had to keep moving.And there was no way in hell he'd be getting any sleep, anyway. 

 

At least studying would take his mind off of all this shit. 

 

A couple hours later, Zoro took his test, and it was about what he expected.He fumbled his way through page after page of multiple choice questions, barely able to keep his eyes open by the end of it.After class, he went straight home, sprawled out on the couch, and passed out. 

 

When Zoro woke up again, it was to the sound of a woman's voice.

 

“This place is so _gross_ , Zoro.I can't believe you live here.” 

 

Shit. He knew that whiny, high-pitched voice all too well.Groggily, Zoro opened one eye and saw a flash of pink hair.  

 

“And it stinks _,_ too.People actually smoke inside?”

 

No doubt it was her.Although Zoro's half-asleep brain couldn't figure out _why_ she'd be there.

 

Closing his eyes again, Zoro rolled around and buried his face in the arm of the couch.He was still so fucking tired.Although he already knew she wasn't going to let him sleep any longer.

“You don't even smoke, but I bet you always smell like an ashtray.”

 

Zoro felt the cushions sink in a little as a warm body shoved into the front of his knees.

 

“What's up with this place, anyway?”She was still good at keeping up one-sided conversations as he remembered.“No one answered the door, and when I tried to open it, it wasn't even locked.I could be totally ripping you off right now, you know.”

 

“It'd be easier if all I had to deal with was someone trying to steal shit,” he mumbled, finally rolling over and tiredly opening his eyes, squinting against the bright lights from the window.Dammit, had she actually opened the _curtains_?  

 

“What, you mean instead of me?That's so _rude_ , Zoro, especially since we haven't seen each other in forever,” she huffed.

 

Zoro's gaze shifted to her, his eyes still only open a sliver.“What would they steal, anyway?”

 

She leaned further back against his legs, clearly not too concerned about how hard her elbow may or may not have been digging into his kneecap as she took a long look around the room.“I see your point.How old _is_ that TV, anyway?”

 

Zoro finally sat up little, tucking his hands behind his head, elbows sticking upward.“So what the hell are you doing here, Perona?” 

 

Perona was putting on her best poker face, but Zoro felt her whole body tense in front of his legs.She pressed her lips together and tucked a few strands of loose hair behind her ears.It was as long as it'd ever been, but she never wore those childish pigtails anymore.The pigtails he'd made fun of all throughout high school.She looked a little more grown up these days—but Zoro knew better.There was a pretty good chance she was about to throw a tantrum.

 

Perona glared at him and Zoro frowned a little.She was definitely pissed at him, but he didn't have a clue about what.He hadn't even seen her since—shit, he couldn't remember, but maybe last spring.

 

“Why didn't you tell me you'd moved, Zoro?”

 

Zoro paused mid-breath.

 

Ah, shit. 

 

A long pause stretched between them before he finally said, “It happened, uh, kind of suddenly.”

 

“I went to your old apartment.”She said it like she was accusing him of doing something wrong.  

 

“Uh, why?”

 

“To see you, idiot!” 

 

“You should've called me first.”

 

“I know that!” 

 

Her voice had raised probably an octave or so, and she gave Zoro a look like she was ready to slap him, her puffy cheeks turning pink.But then her face and shoulders went slack, and she slumped back against him, like whatever angry fire that'd been building up in her had suddenly burned out.  

 

“I... lost all my phone numbers a few months ago,” she muttered under her breath, crossing her arms as she glared down at the floor.

 

“Huh.That was dumb.”

 

“I didn't do it on _purpose!_ ” she exploded again.“Besides, when I don't call you for so long, you should call me!”

 

“I never call anyone.”

 

“I know, but—but—you should've told me you moved, Zoro.”

 

She sank a little deeper into the couch, damn near crushing his legs now.But even though Perona was immature and prone to throwing fits, there was something more to it.  

 

Shit, he'd probably hurt her feelings, actually.Zoro should've known something was up when he hadn't gotten a single call or text from her for months and months, too.  

 

“Sorry.”There wasn't much else he could say.  

 

“You should be!What if I'd tried to send you a Christmas present or something?”

 

He considered it for a moment.“Then you would've already figured out I'd moved.”

 

Perona reached around and smacked him lightly on the side of his leg.She was still sticking out her bottom lip, but her expression had already softened.  

 

He tried to pull himself upright a little more, wriggling his legs until she finally moved and he could pull himself free.  

 

“So, what _are_ you doing here?” he asked.  

 

“Oh, I was just in the area.”She gestured at him as her eyes wandered away from him.

 

Zoro furrowed his brow.“Why?”

 

“Because I have _things_ to do,” she said, a bit defensively.

 

“Here?”

 

“ _Yes._ Isn't that what I said?” she glared.  

 

“I'm the only person you know out here.”

 

“Isn't that presumptuous of you.”She stuck her nose in the air.“As if I'd drive five hours just to see you.I have things to do that are none of your business, that's all.”

 

That sounded like bullshit.Not to mention, she was fidgety—like she was nervous.And that was behavior that was all too familiar to Zoro.There was something else going on that she wasn't telling him.

 

It'd be easier for him if he just ignored it.Yeah, he should do just that...  

 

He did his best to hold back a sigh. 

 

“Did something happen?”

 

Perona stared down at her boots like she was mad at them, a big crinkle forming in her brow.

 

Damn, Zoro hated this kind of shit.He wasn't good at dealing with it, and he didn't particularly _like_ dealing with it.But since this was Perona—he could probably guess what the root of the problem was.  

 

Taking a deep breath, he sank back into the couch and tilted his head back, covering his eyes with one arm.“Did something happen with that Moria guy?” 

 

_“_ What?No... _No._ How dare you, we're perfectly fine.”

 

Bulls eye.The corner of his lip twitched just slightly.  

 

“I'm surprised it lasted that long at all,” he tested.“That guy had to be over twice your age.”

 

“He is _not_ over twice my age!”

 

“He's not?”He peeked at her from under his arm. 

 

Perona pressed her lips together.“Well... Next year, he'll be exactly twice my age.”

 

Zoro frowned.He wasn't really a math person.Didn't even really know his times tables that well.But something didn't seem right.If he'd be twice her age next year, didn't that mean—

 

“ _Anyways_ , it doesn't matter, because—because we're totally okay,” Perona declared, her lips curling into a frown.  

 

Even though Zoro hadn't seen her in awhile, he could tell the heavy eyeliner around her eyes was a little more smudged than usual.  

 

He didn't push her any more, though.She didn't want to talk about it now, but she would later, if she really wanted to.Probably too much.

 

“So, you want a drink or something?”Zoro asked, sitting up, stretching his arms and popping his elbows.

 

Perona crinkled her nose.“No thanks, I don't want whatever grandpa beer is in your fridge.”

 

“We have stuff besides beer,” he said, reluctantly pulling his body into a standing position.His legs were actually really sore.Too many squats yesterday, probably.“I'm not the only one who lives here.”

 

“Make me a mai tai, then,” she said smugly.

 

Zoro gave her a look.“Like I'd know how to make that.”

 

“Well, what _can_ you make?”  

 

He thought about it as he walked to the kitchen.“We may have... wine.”  

 

She made some kind of outraged scoffing noise.“Are you serious, Zoro?You can't make _any_ drinks?”

 

Opening the fridge, Zoro noticed a jug of orange juice on the top shelf.And they always had vodka.  

 

“Screwdriver?”

 

With an exasperated sigh, Perona stood up and followed him into the kitchen.“Let me see what you have.”

 

Zoro opened a cupboard and waved a hand at it.“This is the liquor, and there's... mixer shit in the fridge.”

 

“Geez, there's a lot of stuff in here,” she commented, reaching into the jam-packed cupboard to see what bottles were further into the back.“I bet you didn't pick out any of this, either.”

 

No shit.When Zoro got a bottle, it was rarely around long enough to get put away.

 

“Seriously!” she turned to him, holding a bottle of some kind of schnapps he'd never have looked twice at.“Do you live with a bartender or something?”

 

“Yeah, although I bet the one who got that—“ Zoro paused, chewing at the side of his lip for a moment.He didn't really know how to explain Sanji.Didn't want to try.Shouldn't have even made the comment, but now he was half-way into a sentence.

 

“Is _what?_ ” Perona asked, her eyes suddenly fixed on him a little too alertly.

 

“—He goes overboard on shit like that.”

 

She looked like she was about to ask something else, but then she turned her head to the sound of an opening door.

 

Zoro nearly turned to look, but caught himself at the last second.There weren't many people who'd carelessly fling the front door open like that.And there was only one asshole who stomped around in shoes that were that goddamn loud.  

 

It was like Sanji'd been fucking cued or something.Zoro glanced at the clock on the microwave.It was early.Way earlier than he'd usually get home.

 

Perona regarded him for only a second before she turned back to Zoro.“Where are your glasses?”

 

Zoro pointed at another cupboard.From the corner of his eye, he could already see Sanji closing in.Heading toward the kitchen.Zoro was surprised the fucker wasn't goddamn _running_.

 

The corner of Zoro's lip twitched.

 

“You need some help?” Sanji asked, his eyes resting on Zoro for a second before he turned toward Perona.Zoro's shoulders stiffened. 

 

“Why?” Perona asked, giving Sanji a sideways glance.

 

“If you're making a drink, I can make it for you.” 

 

Her eyes narrowed.“You're the bartender?”

 

“No, but I can make a lot of things, if you want something in particular,” Sanji replied, gesturing as he spoke, a cigarette tucked between two fingers.“Or I could suggest a few things—”

 

“So he's the _other_ one, then,” Perona said to Zoro, completing ignoring the rest of whatever Sanji had to say.  

 

“The... other one?”Sanji said, pronouncing the words slowly, furrowing his brow.He turned toward Zoro, met his eyes and held his gaze there, as if he was waiting for something.Like an explanation, or an insult.

 

But nothing came to Zoro.He didn't want to talk to Sanji right then, or ever, actually, so he turned around and walked away.He sat down on the couch facing away from the kitchen, so he wouldn't have to watch them.Watch him. 

 

Zoro was annoyed at Sanji being there.He didn't even understand why.No, there was nothing _to_ understand.He just didn't like being around Sanji and that was that.

 

They hadn't even said a goddamn word to each other since that fight.  

 

“I asked Zoro to make me a mai tai,” Perona sniffed, not offering any further explanation for her comment.Zoro was a little relieved for that.  

 

“A mai tai, huh.”A pause as Sanji clinked around a few bottles in their liquor cupboard, and, seemingly satisfied by whatever he found, he replied, “You got it.”

 

“You want a beer, right, Zoro?”Perona called out, taking a few steps toward Zoro, her clunky heels noisy against the hardwood.  

 

“Yeah,” Zoro nodded, not turning to face her.

 

She didn't ask him what kind.He never cared, and she knew it.Zoro stared forward at the blank TV screen, and he wound up watching their reflections in it anyway.Perona's shoes thudded back over to the refrigerator and he heard a click as she grabbed one of the beer bottles from the inside of the door.

 

“I need a bottle opener,” Perona said to Sanji. 

 

Sanji immediately started rummaging around in a drawer, and even though Zoro couldn't make out his expression on the TV screen, he could _hear_ Sanji's fake fucking smile as he finally found the bottle opener and handed it to Perona, and said, “Here you are.”  

 

Perona didn't move to grab it.After both of them stared each other down for a moment, Perona held out the bottle.

 

“Aren't you going to offer to open it for me?” she asked, like she was offended.

 

The pause wasn't that long, but it sure as hell felt like it.Sanji turned toward Zoro—Zoro could see it in the reflection—as he reached out and took the bottle from her.

 

Perona had no idea what that meant.

 

But Zoro had no idea either.Just like he had no idea why Sanji's head stayed turned in Zoro's direction as he pulled the cap off of the bottle with a dull pop.

 

“Here you are.”Sanji's voice was reserved as he finally turned back toward Perona and handed her the opened bottle. 

 

Perona grabbed it without a word, walked up to Zoro, and shoved the beer right in front of his face as she sank into the couch next to him.  

 

A moment later, Sanji came over to hand Perona her drink.It was one of the nicest glasses in their mixed up collection.And that asshole had actually garnished it with a toothpick spearing a maraschino cherry.Zoro was only mildly surprised they had both of those items somewhere in their kitchen.

 

“Thanks,” she replied curly, reluctantly accepting the glass, openly unimpressed by the presentation of it.

 

Perona didn't comment as she brought the small straw to her lips and took the first sip, but from the look on her face, it was probably good.  

 

Of course it was.

 

Zoro felt his stomach drop a little, because it was pretty goddamn likely Sanji was about to sit down with them.With Perona.Because why the fuck wouldn't he.It was just what he did.

 

But first, he went back into the kitchen.Probably to get a drink himself.Some of that shitty wine he seemed to always buy a case of after a payday.Then he'd come sit with them.  

 

Zoro took a very long sip of his beer. He should've gotten something stronger.

 

Perona started talking to him—about a whole bunch of things that he was only paying a little bit of attention to.The trips she'd been on lately and all the cute clothes she'd bought.The new car she'd just gotten that was parked outside.  

 

He tried to listen, but with each clink and clack of things from the kitchen, he dreaded that Sanji would finish whatever the hell he was doing and come sit with them.Zoro's eyes kept flickering to the TV screen.Watching Sanji's reflection.

 

Dammit, he needed to think of some way to get out of there.But Perona has barely even touched her drink.She was so slow to finish things.  

 

Zoro's beer was already nearly empty.

 

“Do you guys want something to eat?” Sanji called out from the kitchen.“I was about to get started on some dinner.”

 

“Nah, we're about to leave, actually,” Perona replied quickly.“Zoro has a place he thinks I'll like.”

 

“Yeah.We should probably go.”

 

“Yeah, let's.I'm _starving,_ ” Perona agreed, handing him her half-empty glass.  

 

Zoro downed the rest of the drink in two gulps while she stood up and smoothed out her dress. 

 

Shit.It really _was_ good.Sweet, but good.

 

Zoro's eyes flitted over to the kitchen, and he realized Sanji was looking over at them.As Zoro started to turn away, their eyes locked.

 

For a beat, he felt frozen.Everything felt so off, and it made Zoro feel restless, like uncomfortable in his own skin, like he just wanted to get out of there and keep running until the feeling went away.

 

The whole thing was making his equilibrium feel off.Sanji should've looked away.He should've gone to hole himself up in his room for awhile, until Zoro left.Or maybe fucking never came home in the first place, so he could go find the next person he was going to fuck.

 

And why the _fuck_ wasn't Sanji all over Perona.Of all the shit he'd seen Sanji do, why did he have to pick this particular moment to suddenly start acting like a normal human being.Like his sole motivation in life wasn't to figure out the next place he could stick his dick into.  

 

Zoro turned away and started walking toward the door.

 

“If there are any leftovers, I'll put them in the fridge,” Sanji mentioned.

 

These wasn't like Sanji at all.Maybe he was on some weird fucking personality-altering drug or something.That could explain it.Because Zoro knew Sanji, and he knew how he was supposed to act in this situation.  

 

Once Zoro and Perona were on the front porch, he slammed the door closed behind him.He was done thinking about Sanji.

 

“I'm parked on the street.”

 

Zoro could already tell which car was hers, though.There were rarely cars parked this far down the street, but even if there had been, her car would've looked pretty out of place.It was black and sleek and perfectly detailed.It looked just look something she'd pick out.Expensive, too.Well, that Moria guy was loaded.

 

“You could've parked in the driveway.”

 

“The pavement's way too uneven.I didn't want to mess up my alignment or something.”

 

Huh.It was pretty uneven.He'd never noticed.It never seemed to bother Usopp's old boat.Her car was a lot lower to the ground, though.

 

“So, uh, what's this place I think you'll like?” Zoro asked, opening the car door and ducking into the bucket seat.  

 

“Oh, I don't know.I just wanted to get out of there.”

 

It was so goddamn clean in there.Cleaner than anything Zoro had ever owned in his life.Not even a stray wrapper or piece of paper anywhere.Perona's familiar, too-sweet perfume mingled with the new car smell. 

 

“What do you want?”

 

She shrugged.“Just pick something I'd like.”

 

Zoro rubbed his face.“Like what?”

 

“Hmm, someplace cute.You know.Nice aesthetic.Preferably gluten-free options.”

 

“You don't eat gluten?”Zoro asked, trying to remember what exactly that was.Flour or something?

 

“I just like it when I can order things without it.”

 

Zoro rolled his eyes.He sure as hell would've never noticed if any restaurants around town had shit without gluten, but—somewhere cute.No, somewhere _Perona_ would consider cute.

 

“I know a place.”

 

“Good,” Perona said, punching a couple of buttons on the screen to the GPS-thing built into the dashboard.“Put in the name here.”

 

“I can just tell you how to get there.”

 

“I want to eat _tonight,_ Zoro.”

 

“The hell's that supposed to mean?”

 

She glared at him in a way that made him give in a little too quickly, and Perona finally put the car in motion.

 

How the hell—he hadn't seen her put a key in.  

 

“How _did_ you get my address, anyway?” Zoro bent forward to look at the steering column.There wasn't even a place to _put_ a key.Huh.He'd heard of cars that just needed to have the key nearby to start, but he'd never actually been in one before.Not even when he was a valet.

 

Perona suddenly slammed on the brakes and Zoro barely leaned back in time to stop his head from smashing into the dash.

 

“Oh my god, it was such a _pain_!” 

 

“Shit, what the hell is wrong with you?”

 

“Come on, we were going like three miles an hour,” she snapped, pressing her foot on the accelerator again.“And what's wrong with me is that you're _such_ an asshole.”

 

“Huh? _Why?”_

 

“Because you didn't tell me where you live now!I went to your old apartment looking for you, you know.Or I _tried_ to.It's like, the whole thing's totally blocked off for some reason—”

 

“Condemned,” Zoro filled in.

 

“Eugh, that's gross.And I didn't know what to do, so I tried going to your old work.”

 

“Uh, which one?”

 

“That disgusting sports bar place,” she barked, jamming on the brake again.Well, this time they were actually at a stop sign. 

 

He frowning, staring at the road ahead.“I haven't worked there for awhile.”

 

“Yeah, I kinda guessed that, considering how no one remembered you.”

 

Probably not.He hadn't worked there long. 

 

“So then I went to your school,” she said in a huff.

 

“That campus is huge, though.” 

 

“I freaking _know that_ now.But I thought maybe if I hung around the gym, you'd be there.Fencing or whatever.”

 

Zoro pressed his lips together as the GPS announced a right turn ahead.

 

“I was about to give up,” Perona huffed. “But then I remembered those idiot friends of yours.Johnny and the other guy.”

 

“Yosaku?”Zoro wouldn't have expected she'd remember them at all.Especially where they lived.  

 

“Yeah, whatever,” she shrugged.“So I go there—and no one is home, _of course._ But I waited a little bit, and just as I was getting ready to leave, they showed up.”

 

“Geez,” Zoro murmured, leaning forward in his seat a little.

 

“'Geez'?That's _all_ you have to say about that?Did you even listen to what I went through for you today?”

 

Yeah, he had listened.He just didn't really know what to say.Perona had always been tenacious about the dumbest things.But to go to four different places to track him down—that was actually nuts.There weren't a lot of people who'd do that much for him.Or who'd give a shit about where he was.

 

It made him feel a little guilty.  

 

Swallowing, Zoro pulled his phone out of his pocket and scrolled through his contacts.There weren't a lot in there.More like a graveyard of old jobs. He frowned. 

 

Finally, he reached her name and wordlessly clicked the button to call, and a second later, an eerie symphonic metal song blared from inside of Perona's purse. 

 

“Nice ringtone.”

 

“It's cute, isn't it?” she smiled, one hand already digging for her phone.

 

“It's me, you don't need to answer it.”

 

“Oh, okay.”  

 

He'd done it so she'd have his number again.But he didn't want to talk about it any further, and Perona didn't mention it again.  

 

When they arrived at the restaurant Zoro had picked out for them, Perona pulled into a parking spot and frowned up at the old building, making a face like it smelled bad or something.It didn't look like much, though.A tiny diner at the ass-end of an office park that had probably hit its prime two or three decades ago, next to some kind of discount clothing store and a check cashing place.Maybe it was a discount clothing store _and_ check cashing place.

 

“Zoro, this place looks gross,” she said quietly.

 

He shrugged.“Their food's pretty cheap.”

 

“Is it good?”

 

“For the price.”

 

“That means no,” she sighed, shaking her head, pushing pink hair behind her shoulders. 

 

“We could go to the sports bar instead.It's not far from here.”

 

“Jesus, no,” she said quickly.She pursed her lips as she stared at a bright neon sign on the front window flashing the words _BREAKFAST ALL DAY._ “Do they have milkshakes?”

 

“Yeah.”

 

“Okay,” she said resignedly, finally turning the car off.

 

“I'm pretty sure you'll like it.”

 

“Uh huh.”

 

Zoro actually knewshe'd like it.And sure enough, the moment they stepped through the doors, Perona let out a high-pitched squeal.Everyone in the place—which was only about nine or so people, staff included—turned to look at her.

 

“It's so _cute_!” she shrieked, her cell phone already in hand, snapping pictures of the walls.

 

Zoro couldn't help but smirk a little.The old diner didn't have much in the way of décor, but someone had painted murals of cartoony skeletons on the blue-green wall.Skeletons eating burgers, sharing milkshakes, diving into a huge stack of pancakes.It was one of the tackiest—and maybe creepiest—places Zoro'd ever seen.Perona acted like he'd just taken her to Disneyland.

 

After they'd been seated and ordered their food, Zoro leaned back, resting one elbow along the top of the booth, studying her as she told him about some stuffy-sounding event she'd been at with Moria the weekend before.

 

She actually didn't sound that down on her old-man boyfriend.He'd figured she was there because the two of them had gotten in a fight—but that she could talk about the guy without getting all misty-eyed made Zoro wonder what'd really happened.He didn't care that much either way, but, eh, maybe he did.A little bit.

 

“So, what's going on?”Zoro didn't really know any other way to ask but bluntly.

 

Thin eyebrows raised incrementally for a moment before she shook her head from side to side, loose tendrils of hair falling forward slightly.She stuck her nose in the air.“It doesn't matter.” 

 

“Okay.Did something happen?”

 

She pulled out her phone and locked her eyes to the screen, furiously scrolling.“It wasn't that big of a deal.”

 

“Then why are you here?”

 

“That doesn't matter either.”Suddenly, she held her phone out in front of Zoro.“Hey, look at how cute this picture is!” 

 

He stared at it for a moment.It was one of the skeleton mural pictures.A picture that was visible from where they were sitting.Zoro frowned at her, and asked, “You break up?”

 

“No,” she snapped.“No, of course not.It was just—none of your business!”

 

Zoro remained silent, staring at her.He knew he just had to wait a little bit, and sure enough—

 

“Look, it's just—I kind of had these _plans_ for today.And then Moria suddenly decided to make some other stupid plan for us.This stupid gross medical thing he _knew_ I had _zero_ interest in.”

 

Like Zoro had suspected, once Perona got started, she didn't stop for awhile.Their food arrived, and she was still going, even though he wasn't really saying much back.She dropped in a lot of unnecessary details, but basically, Moria had disregarded a plan she'd made for herself, and signed them up to do something else that involved some rich-person event for whatever organization was paying for his research.Sounded boring as hell.

 

“So you're mad, even though you didn't go with him anyway?”Zoro asked slowly.  

 

“That was _not_ the point,” Perona replied huffily.

 

“You're pissed because you had a thing to do today.”

 

“Yes.”

 

“But instead of doing that thing, you're here,” Zoro pointed out, taking a large bite out of his burger.

 

Suddenly Perona had this weird fucking look on her face, and fell _silent_ of of all things.

 

That said a lot.As Zoro chewed his bite and watched her take a lot of interest in her strawberry milkshake, he thought about how the last time he'd seen her was around the same time last year.And, come to think of it, she'd been by the year before.Always on this same day.March 4th.

 

Shit.  

 

God damn it.

 

Zoro didn't want to think about it too much.Sure as hell didn't want to ask her about it any further.Perona squirmed a little in the silence, but Zoro just shoved fries into his mouth, not really minding.There was no need to always talk.

 

Besides, Perona was seldom at a loss for words for long.Sure enough, after a minute or two, she'd started prattling about some of the things she'd been up to lately—places she'd visited, some old high school acquaintances of theirs she'd seen, that kind of stuff.Kind of reminded him of high school, actually.

 

Then she got a little quiet, bringing her straw to her mouth, taking a thoughtful sip of her milkshake and studying him.  

 

“What?”

 

“Hmm, just wondering something.”

 

Zoro said nothing, swallowing down the last bite of his food.

 

“What's up with you and that roommate?”

 

Zoro frowned, pressing his lips together.“Nothing.He's an asshole.”

 

“Yeah, but that way you guys acted around each other... It was kind of bizarre.”

 

He shrugged.What the fuck was he supposed to say to that.

 

“You looked _uncomfortable_.”

 

“I was fine,” he said flatly.“We got in a fight recently.Maybe that's why you thought that.”

 

“Ooh?About what?”

 

“I don't even know,” Zoro said with a sigh, shifting uncomfortably.“I don't remember.He came at me, I punched him in the face, we got knocked on the ground.That kind of shit.” 

 

“Oh.So a _fight_ fight.”

 

“Yeah,” Zoro replied, like he thought that was a dumb thing for her to say.Although may it wasn't.

 

“I've never really seen you like that with someone.”

 

“Like what?”

 

“Like that _tense_.I mean, I've totally seen you around people you thought were assholes—but it didn't feel like you hated the guy or anything.”

 

“Actually,” Zoro narrowed his eyes, “I really fucking do.”

 

“Why?”

 

“Why...” Zoro repeated, frowning as a million reasons sprung into his head all at once.There was no way he was going to be able to pick out one or two particular things, so rattled a few of them off to Perona as they came to mind.

 

Like Sanji's contradictory personality.The ridiculous way he catered to the needs of any pretty women around him, and acted like a jerk to everyone else.Or most of the time, anyway, before he suddenly decided to be nice for no reason whatsoever.How he had a sarcastic comeback to anything that was said to him.His smoking.His drinking.The way he dressed.Shit, there was so much about Sanji that made him angry.

 

Perona listened patiently, until Zoro finally ran out of things to say.

 

“Are you done?” she asked.

 

“Yeah.”

 

“Geez, Zoro, you might as well go sleep with him and get it over with.”

 

Zoro bristled at the remark, slamming his glass of water on the table.  

 

“What the fuck are you talking about?” 

 

“Come on, you _clearly_ have a huge boner for him.”Perona rolled her eyes.“I had a hunch earlier, but now I'm a hundred percent sure.”

 

The actual fuck?“Did you listen to _anything_ I just told you?”

 

“Yeah, I listened—I listened to you talking about someone for like fifteen whole minutes.”

 

“That's because you asked me—”  

 

“Zoro,” Perona interrupted, and he didn't like the way she said his name. “You never talk about _anything_ for fifteen minutes.”

 

He opened his mouth, but it took him a few seconds before he could string together a response. 

 

“It's because I just fucking hate him that much, that's all.”

 

Perona said nothing else, but the look on her face made it clear she was unconvinced.God dammit.

 

She didn't bring up Sanji again.They hung out at the diner for a little longer before Perona suggested they go to a bar.Which Zoro was on board with.She picked out some kind of fancy place that she found on yelp that was a little too trendy for Zoro, but since she loved it and he didn't need to pay for it, he didn't complain too much.  

 

Sometime after midnight, they headed to her car, Zoro walking slightly behind Perona as she swayed in her heels.

 

“You need to drive,” she announced, glaring at him from over her shoulder.

 

“Yeah, I figured.”  

 

“And I need to find a hotel.”

 

“Huh?Why?”

 

“To _sleep,_ obviously.”

 

What a pain.“Just crash at the Sunny.”

 

“The Sunny?” she repeated as they both settled down inside the car.

 

“Uh—the house I live in.”Zoro felt around the bottom of the seat until he found the button that made the seat slide back.

 

“You _named_ your house?” she asked incredulously.

 

Zoro paused. “My roommates did.Habit kind of stuck.”

 

“It's kind of cute.But I would've given it a more fitting name.”

 

“What's more fitting?”

 

She hummed for a moment.“Maybe something like... the Hill House.No, wait, the Whaley House. Or the Amityville Horror House.Is that one too obvious?”

 

“Those are terrible.It's old, but it's not _haunted._ ”

 

“Are you sure?” 

 

“I guess you'll see for yourself soon.”

 

When they got to the Thousand Sunny, Zoro parked on the street, and as they were walking up the driveway together, the front door flew open and Brook burst outside.In the shitty porch lighting, he was even more surreal than normal.He was also wearing some kind of outfit that Zoro was pretty sure he'd only seen men wear in black and white TV shows.

 

“Oh my god, did you see that?” Perona squealed.“It really _is_ haunted!”

 

“It's not,” Zoro grimaced.

 

“Didn't you see that?!”

 

“Yeah, he's our landlord,” Zoro muttered.

 

“That's a lame excuse, Zoro.”

 

“Look.He's going to the house next store.”

 

“Oh,” she murmured, openly disappointed.

 

Even though it was late, the house was full of people.Luffy was sitting with a couple of his friends who Zoro had never met—or maybe he had, it was hard to keep track.He wasn't surprised people were still up, though.Zoro had been sort of hoping he could sleep on the couch, but, whatever.

 

He and Perona headed upstairs, and Zoro actually remembered there were extra blankets in one of the hall linen closets.He grabbed a couple of them, and when they got to his room, he threw them all on the floor and told Perona she could sleep on the bed.  

 

“You sure? We could probably both fit up here.”

 

“I bet your eighty-year-old boyfriend would like that,” Zoro replied, wasting no time flopping down onto the pile of blankets he'd just laid down, grabbing a pair of old sweatpants to ball up and use as a pillow.He'd never really minded sleeping in uncomfortable places.

 

“He's not that old, asshole!” she shouted, her cheeks puffing up indignantly.“He just turned forty-three.”

 

Wait, earlier hadn't she said—Zoro paused to calculate.“So he _is_ more than twice your age.”

 

“Shut up, that wasn't the point,” she huffed, crossing her arms.“I'm going to use your bathroom.Do you have towels?”

 

“Uh, same closet I just got the blankets from.”

 

“Okay.”

 

Once she came back and the lights were out, Perona still kept talking for awhile, sleepily and a bit drunkenly.Finally, she stopped, maybe because she'd run out of things to say—or more likely, she'd gotten too tired to keep going.Zoro was nearly asleep when she suddenly spoke again.

 

“You've changed, Zoro.”

 

He twitched a little, not bothering to open his eyes.Her tone was a lot more serious than before.Maybe it was the only reason he was paying any attention at all.“How?” he asked groggily.

 

“I'm sure it was hard for you—changing, I mean,” she went on, ignoring his question, “but I think it's good.You're still kind of a downer sometimes, though.”

 

“Thanks,” he muttered in reply, not exactly sure what he was thanking her for.She didn't speak again—or if she did, he never got to hear it.

 

The next morning, Perona was awake before him.As he blinked against the sunlight, rubbing sleep from his eyes, he noticed Perona standing near the old mirror screwed into his wall—it had come as part of the room, not anything he'd gotten himself—and she was shimmying into a dress, sliding it over a frilly, mis-matched bra and underwear set.

 

“You know, the bathroom is right outside that door,” he croaked, his voice still thick from sleep.

 

Perona craned her neck back to look at him.She looked a lot softer without all that dark eye stuff she liked so much.“It's just you,” she shrugged. “I'm leaving in an hour, you should get up.”

 

She finished dressing, moving onto her make-up.If she hadn't started speaking to him again, he probably would've passed back out.

 

“Zoro, I don't know what's going through your big dumb head right now, but don't be an idiot.”

 

“Huh?”  

 

Zoro had no idea what the hell that meant.He was pretty sure nothing _had_ been going through his head at the moment.Other than something about how damn bright it was.

 

Perona paused in front of the mirror, her eyes finding the worn out floorboards.

 

“You know what I'm saying?”

 

“Not a clue.”

 

“I'm glad you're sort of doing something you feel good about now.Something you actually _like_ doing.”

 

So goddamn cryptic.She probably meant the boxing thing, though.She had been surprisingly open to the idea of it when he'd told her about it at the bar.Of him maybe taking it seriously.Even if he'd definitely heard her call it—or pretty much any sport in general—dumb before.

 

Suddenly, she turned away from the mirror and looked straight at him, a surprisingly serious look on her face.

 

“I'm just saying, it's okay to do things just because you want to do them.You should do a lot of things you want to do, you know?And whatever's holding you back—it's probably really dumb.”  

 

Zoro tensed.“Uh, okay,” was all he managed to say in response.

 

Then Perona turned back toward the mirror, back to drawing a thick black border around her eyelashes.

 

Zoro rolled onto his back, covering his eyes with the crook of his elbow.He wasn't good with subtlety.That kind of shit went over his head.But this time, he got the subtext.Normally, it'd be worthy of an internal pat on the back or something.

 

Instead, he wished he hadn't understood what Perona meant.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Usopp’s tongue felt like it was on motherfucking fire.  

 

He was actually trying not to cry.Or throw up.Both of those things were extremely pressing to him at the moment, for various reasons.  

 

Even trying to keep his mouth shut was almost too fucking much.His eyes were wide and his hands were shaking.  

 

Half an hour earlier, everything had actually been...pretty great, all things considered.  

 

Holy fuck.

 

He wanted to blame Sanji for all of this.But, well, obviously, it wasn’t _Sanji’s_ fault that his life was coming apart at the seams, and that the reality of what he was seeing happen right in front of his face with his own two eyes was making him want to faint.He couldn’t faint.He had to keep it together, because Chopper was probably going to faint, judging by the look on his face, and _that_ was too much.  

 

All of this was too much.And he couldn’t blame Sanji because it wasn’t his fault.  

 

But.Well.It was Sanji’s fault that his mouth was on fire.That was all on him.  

 

Usopp mentally backtracked.  

 

Half an hour ago.  

 

A lot could happen in half an hour, apparently.  

 

Only half an hour ago, Usopp had been laughing.Laughing really hard, actually, with Nami and Chopper.They’d been sitting at the counter/bar with Zoro, and in front of them, Sanji was pacing around the kitchen, talking about food and other food-related bullshit.  

 

Luffy had just run upstairs to take a shower, and then he was going to come back down and join them for dinner.  

 

Things were, at that moment, really fucking great.

 

Everyone was together, which was rare anymore, but it felt really good, having the whole group there.Nobody had work that night, and nobody had pressingly urgent school shit to work on, or plans to go out, and everyone was...getting along and drinking beer and, shit, it really felt like the way things used to be.And Usopp was really happy about it.  

 

So happy, that he got a little ahead of himself, or maybe it was because he was three beers deep, but either way, he kind of screwed himself early on in the night.  

 

Sanji was kind of rambling about food with a glass of wine in his hand—actually, a glass mug, which looked pretty funny because he still sipped at it like he was holding a fancy wine glass—and he was looking kind of happy while he told some story about some extra-spicy dish he made once for a contest or something.  

 

“There’s no such thing as too spicy,” Usopp said into his can of shitty beer.  

 

“You say that, but—“ Sanji began, but Usopp cut him off.  

 

“Yeah, yeah, I get what you’re trying to say, but I’m, like, a boss at spicy food.” 

 

Which was totally true.Usopp loved spicy food.He always had.He always ordered the hottest shit whenever there were spicy things on the menu at restaurants.When he had money for restaurants, anyway.  

 

“Do you wanna make a bet?” Sanji asked, and everyone at the bar—Nami and Chopper and Zoro—stayed silent while Sanji gave Usopp this _look_ that, honestly, made Usopp’s gut scream at him to not take this bet.But.  

 

“Uh.What’re you—“

 

“I’ll make you a burger, and if you can eat the whole thing and not puke, I’ll cook for you for, uh, a whole week,” Sanji said, pausing to take another sip from his wine mug.  

 

Usopp snorted.“A burger? That’s it?” 

 

“It’s a really spicy burger.Also, you can’t cry.You also lose if you cry.”

 

“I’m way too manly and confident to ever cry in front of any of you.Actually, I don’t cry.I’ve never once cried—“

 

“So you’re in?” Sanji asked, looking blatantly hopeful.  

 

Usopp cleared his throat.“If I eat some spicy burger you make and don’t barf, you’ll cook for me for an entire week? Like, every meal?” 

 

“Yes.Or cry.You can’t cry, either.”

 

“Yeah, I got that,” Usopp said.“How long do I have to eat it?” 

 

“I’unno.Half an hour.” 

 

Usopp laughed, all confidence and bravado.“For one burger? Pff, easy.But, okay—what do _you_ get out of this bet?” 

 

Because there had to be something.Right?

 

Sanji shrugged and smiled.“The satisfaction of watching you try to eat this burger.As a chef and as your friend.” 

 

“It’s a _burger_ , it’s not like you’re making some crazy Thai or Chinese shit—“

 

“It’s _really spicy_ , Usopp.” 

 

Nami leaned on Usopp’s shoulder, and she clinked her can of beer against his, and he almost dropped it.  

 

“Do it.You destroyed that buffalo chicken pizza, and that was spicy as hell.You totally got this,” she said to him, and Chopper and Zoro started egging him on, too.  

 

“You can totally do it, Usopp!” 

 

“Do it, nerd.”

 

Well.Okay.He couldn’t really say no after all that.  

 

“You’re on,” Usopp said, and he got a few cheers for that.  

 

He should have fucking known better, honestly.  

 

Sanji made everyone burgers that night, and he made a few extra for when Luffy came downstairs—which, Luffy was taking forever, but whatever, he always took long showers—and Usopp got a special burger, which, actually, it looked better than everyone else’s.Nice.

 

“Do I get to drink anything?” Usopp asked as Sanji placed everyone’s meal in front of them.  

 

“Sure.You can drink water.” 

 

“You’re making this all too easy, Sanji,” Usopp said, puffing out his chest a little.  

 

“Am I?” 

 

Sanji even went so far as to grab a glass of water _for_ him, and as he prepared to take his first bite, he realized everyone was watching him.  

 

It couldn’t be that bad, right? 

 

Wrong.Totally wrong.Super, extra, hardcore wrong.And he should have _fucking known better_.  

 

After Usopp took the first bite, it was alright, for, like, a second.After he chewed it, he almost couldn’t swallow it.  

 

His eyes started watering immediately.  

 

“Oh, you’re a fucking asshole,” Usopp barely managed to say after he barely managed to swallow.  

 

Sanji started laughing, leaning against the far counter, and Nami slapped Usopp on the back, encouraging him, and it wasn’t encouraging at all.It was only making him want to choke.But she was trying.  

 

“I got this,” Usopp said, sitting up straighter, and he could hear Zoro snort at the end of the bar.Usopp ignored him.“If I don’t got this, we have a doctor on site.” 

 

“I’m not a doctor,” Chopper said.  

 

“My life is in your hands.” 

 

“It is _not!_ ”

 

The second bite was worse than the first.This was actual hell.Usopp started literally sweating.  

 

He made it halfway through the burger by the time all of them were cheering at him.  

 

Maybe they were a little drunk.Maybe _he_ was a little drunk.Even Sanji was shouting at him that he could do it.  

 

Zoro laughed as he said to Sanji, “You really are a fucking asshole.” 

 

“Maybe a little bit,” Sanji smiled back at him a bit, and yeah, whatever, it was good to see those idiots starting to get along again, but—

 

“I’m glad you two are bonding over my suffering here, that’s really nice and all, but, really, fuck you both—“

 

“You asked for it!” Sanji pointed out, going to refill his mug.  

 

“We aren’t fucking _bonding—“_ Zoro began, but Usopp ignored him.  

 

“I was tricked! I was _befuddled_ by your slick words and your smooth European cuisine—“

 

“I’m pretty sure burgers are an American creation,” Sanji said, crossing his arms over his chest.  

 

“ _Whatever_ , asshole, point is, I regret this deeply, but I’m too far in to back out now, so.You’re a jerk,” Usopp said in between taking great chugging gulps from the cup of water Sanji had brought him and kept refilling.The water did literally nothing to help him.

 

“You kind of _are_ a jerk, Sanji, honestly” Chopper grinned, and Sanji gave him a fairly nasty look.  

 

Nami’s hand went to Usopp’s shoulder.“Just think.A whole week.Breakfast and dinner, Sanji will cook you all this great shit,” she said, trying to rally him.  

 

“And lunch.He’s making me lunch, too,” Usopp added.

 

“If you don’t barf or cry. You look like you’re tearing up again,” Sanji started to say, but Usopp was quick to follow up on him, despite the fact that even speaking hurt, what the fuck.  

 

“I’m not going to cry. _You’re_ going to cry.” 

 

Sanji snorted at him.“Why am I going to cry—“

 

“I don’t know! You just are!” Usopp shouted, and Nami laughed at him, which really wasn’t helping.  

 

But okay.A few more bites.Home stretch.  

 

“He’s gonna do it,” Zoro said to Sanji, who was still grinning over this whole thing.  

 

“He’s not.” 

 

“He is!” Chopper added, enthusiastic as it got, siding with Zoro and even leaning up on him a bit, pointing at Sanji, beer in hand.  

 

“He’s going to throw up in ten minutes, watch," Sanji replied.

 

“I have a stomach made of gold and steel and courage and I’m not going to throw up,” Usopp said, more to himself than anyone, and he took the last fucking bite and swallowed and threw his arms into the air.  

 

“See!” Chopper yelled, and Nami and Zoro were actually clapping—both of them doing that polite golf clap thing—and Sanji was laughing at him because, fuck him, Usopp was probably going to throw up in, like, ten minutes.  

 

“I’m so proud of you,” Nami said, rubbing the top of his head and messing up his goddamn ponytail, she knew he _hated_ that, but—

 

“You still can’t throw up,” Sanji interrupted.  

 

“I’m not gonna!” Usopp shouted right back at him, and Zoro got up to go grab another beer, but he clapped Usopp on the back first.  

 

“I’m pretty impressed, though,” Sanji added in, sticking a cigarette between his lips and lighting it.  

 

“That was so badass, Usopp!” Chopper cheered, rocking back on his barstool, and Usopp smiled, even though pressing his lips together like that made him want to scream.  

 

Aside from the volcano in his mouth, things were pretty goddamn great, in that moment.  

 

The congratulatory celebration died a little at the sound of a loud knock on the door, though.  

 

“Who the hell even bothers knocking these days?” Nami asked, spinning around in her seat, but making no move to get up.  

 

“I’unno.Go answer the door, asshole,” Sanji said to Zoro while he hoisted himself up on the back counter, reaching for an ashtray.  

 

“You go get it, prick,” Zoro returned, cracking open his new can of beer.  

 

“You’re already up! And shut up, you’re the closest.”

 

“Whatever.You’re so fucking...” Zoro trailed off, wrinkling his nose while he left his new can of beer on the counter, and Usopp might’ve added to this particular commentary, but he was concentrating on keeping it together, even though his shirt was kind of, like, damp with sweat at that point.  

 

“I’m so fucking _what_ , dick?” Sanji called after him.  

 

“So fucking _annoying_!” Zoro shouted over his shoulder, walking to the door.  

 

Usopp turned back to the counter/bar and leaned on it, reaching for his water.He didn’t know why his mouth was still on fire this bad.Like, it was almost worse? He apologized mentally to his tongue.And he would’ve been lost in thought about having a conversation with his own tongue over what he’d put it through over the years, but he was interrupted by the faint sound of Zoro’s low and kind of quiet voice barely reaching him.  

 

“What the fuck...” 

 

Usopp lifted his eyes, and he saw Sanji sitting frozen on the far counter, ashtray still in his lap, cigarette still in his hand, stopped halfway to his mouth.His eyes were huge.He was staring right past Usopp.  

 

So Usopp followed his gaze.He turned slowly in his chair, and he noticed Nami and Chopper just as frozen as Sanji, staring at the door.  

 

And at the door, Zoro stood with his back to them all, and he was slowly raising his hands in the air, like he was being held at gunpoint.  

 

He took a few steps backwards, and two really fucking big guys followed him in, shutting the door behind them, not saying a word, and after Zoro took a couple more steps, Usopp realized he really actually fucking was being held at gunpoint.  

 

Oh.

 

Usopp’s brain sort of shut down, and his heart started pounding all the way down into his fingertips, and the only coherent thought that went through his mind was, _holy shit, Zoro’s about to get shot._

After only a second or two, Usopp’s thoughts immediately started racing, trying to place the faces of the two big guys who were wordlessly forcing Zoro back into the living room, glaring at him, and Usopp thought he’d definitely seen their faces before somewhere, but he had no idea where, and, holy god, was this his fault? Was this his and Nami’s fault? God, this was bad, this probably was linked to them, somehow—

 

“You know who I am, right?” the first guy—the guy with the fucking gun—said to Zoro.  

 

“Hard to forget your face after I beat it in,” Zoro replied, cold, and Usopp’s stomach plummeted because, holy shit, _that’s_ who those guys were—Zoro had beat that one guy up in his very first boxing match and caused that big fucking upset—and also, holy _shit_ , that was so _badass_ of Zoro to say just then.  

 

Usopp glanced at Nami around the same time that she glanced over at him, and they both shared relatively panicked expressions.  

 

From the corner of his eye, Usopp registered the motion of Sanji sliding off the back counter, setting the ashtray to the side.  

 

“Hey! You! Stay right there.None of you move,” the second big guy yelled, prompting the first to point his gun at Sanji, who stopped in his tracks, eyes shifting from Nami, who was right in front of him, to the man pointing a goddamn firearm at him.

 

Zoro didn’t move.He stayed there with his hands up, his face almost blank, staring down the two giant guys in front of him.  

 

“They didn’t do anything,” he said slowly, his voice hard.  

 

“Shut up,” the first guy barked, and the gun returned to its original position of being pointed at Zoro’s face.  

 

“Why are you guys here?” Zoro asked, ignoring the command.  

 

The first guy—guy with the gun—rolled his eyes and grabbed Zoro by the front of his shirt, and he yanked him over a few steps, bringing him closer to Usopp and Nami and everyone by the kitchen.  

 

“Get on your knees,” he said to Zoro, waving the gun just a little, like he was gesticulating his instructions.  

 

“Oh my god, Zoro—“ Nami began, her voice shaking, and Usopp snapped out of his mild shock.  

 

“It’s cool,” Zoro replied, cutting her off.  

 

Zoro’s response was answered by the first guy cracking him across the jaw with the end of his gun, like the guy just straight pistol-whipped him, and Nami yelped a little and Zoro recovered and straightened back up after a second, a hand going to his mouth as he slowly sank to his knees in front of them.  

 

Usopp blinked several times.His tongue felt like it was on motherfucking fire.He was also trying not to cry.Or throw up.Both of those things were extremely pressing to him at the moment.For various reasons.

 

His eyes were wide and his hands were shaking.  

 

Holy fuck.  

 

Usopp remained silent, scared out of his fucking mind, because he was totally powerless and Zoro was possibly about to, like, fucking get shot and killed right in front of him, holy _shit_.  

 

He realized this seemed almost vaguely familiar.This wasn’t the first time Usopp had been too terrified to move because a close friend was being held at gunpoint.And this time it didn’t even have _anything to do with him_ , what the fuck was _going on—_

 

“We’re not gonna kill you,” the first guy said as Zoro glared up at him.  

 

“But we _are_ gonna beat the hell out of you,” second guy added, standing behind Guy Number One, looking casual as hell, like this was a typical Sunday evening for him, smiling like a fucking asshole while he stood in front of the staircase that led to all of the bedrooms upstairs.  

 

Guy Number One handed the gun off to Guy Number Two, who pointed it straight at Usopp.And in response, Usopp lowered his eyes and kept them on Zoro, who he could’ve reached out and fucking touched, he was so close, but fuck, he couldn’t _goddamn move_.  

 

The first guy grabbed Zoro by his hair and drove a giant fist into his face so damn hard that Usopp could _hear_ it, he could hear the sound of bone being smashed in, like Zoro might as well’ve been on the receiving end of a battering ram.Usopp flinched and glanced back up at the second guy.  

 

And the second guy grinned while Usopp was fucking stuck staring down the barrel of a gun.  

 

The sound Zoro made after being hit a second time made Usopp’s attention snap back down to him, and Zoro was bringing a hand to his dripping and red face when Guy Number One kicked him hard enough to knock him from his knees to the hardwood floor beneath him.  

 

“Fuck you guys,” Sanji said in this sort of quiet voice, and Usopp could hear the tension and control in his words, and he could honestly feel the coiled rage that Sanji was trying to contain.  

 

“Yeah? You can be next, blondie,” Guy Number Two said while he retrained his gun on Sanji _._

 

“This is some absurd bullshit, he _beat_ you goddamn nut jobs in a fucking _boxing match—“_ Sanji was saying, speaking through a clenched jaw when Guy Two lowered the safety on his gun with a _click_.  

 

“Keep talking!” 

 

Zoro was pushing himself back upright when Guy One kicked him again—kicked him _hard_ with the flat of his boot—and Usopp barely registered Nami shouting at them to stop, that it was enough, already.  

 

Usopp almost didn’t hear Chopper yelling, either.His pulse was drowning the sound out of his ears.

 

He could see Zoro gritting his teeth.They were red.His mouth was bleeding.

 

Usopp’s body started moving before he told it to, and he was starting to stand and step forward, to do _something_ , but.He froze again.

 

The next course of events happened so fucking fast, it was like...time warped and slowed, and he could take in every detail.A few seconds stretched on almost indefinitely.And Usopp watched with wide eyes.  

 

Guy Two’s eyes turned before the rest of his head did, and he moved in a quick, startled motion, trying to hurry and point and aim his gun up the stairs.  

 

“Shit—“

 

“ _HEY!_ ”

 

Guy Two didn’t get a chance to pull the trigger before Luffy leapt from the stairs.  

 

Holy fuck.Luffy.

 

The soles of both of Luffy’s sandals fucking smashed into Guy Two’s face.And—Christ—Luffy kicked him so hard that Guy Two’s feet left the goddamn floor, and he flew back a few paces before stumbling and crashing to the ground.  

 

The gun clattered to the floor, and everyone moved at the same time.  

 

Usopp and Nami, maybe out of reflex or something, immediately grabbed Chopper and pushed him back behind the both of them, and they scrambled out of the way while Sanji fucking vaulted over the counter/bar and dove at Guy Number One in front of Zoro.Zoro was already on his feet again, joining Sanji in dragging Guy One to the floor.  

 

Luffy was on Guy Two before he had a chance to even start trying to pull himself upright.  

 

“Holy shit,” Chopper breathed when Luffy pummeled Guy Two’s face with his fist several times in a row before kicking him again, knocking him down flat.  

 

“Sanji!” Luffy shouted, extending his arm, holding out his hand, pointing at the gun on the floor.And Sanji responded immediately, kicking the gun to Luffy without hesitation before turning his attention back to Guy One.  

 

Guy One was better off than Guy Two.Usopp and Nami, probably subconsciously, sandwiched together and blocked Chopper’s view.  

 

Luffy grabbed the gun from the floor before it had the chance to skid to a stop, and he held it by the barrel while he used the end of it like a metal club to just fucking smash Guy Two’s face in.  

 

As soon as Guy Two stopped moving altogether after only a few seconds, Luffy dashed back to Guy One.The one Zoro had beaten in a boxing match a month ago.The one who was responsible for all the blood currently dripping from Zoro’s face.

 

Sanji and Zoro had Guy One restrained—both of them using their full weight and strength to hold him down against the hardwood floor.  

 

“Don’t _ever_ _screw with my friends again_!” Luffy shouted, his voice raw, before kicking Guy One right in the fucking teeth.  

 

Usopp found himself suddenly remembering Luffy’s boxing match.It’d been so much different from this.In the basement of that restaurant, in the boxing ring, Luffy had almost been...kind of playing around.Like he hadn’t been serious.The contrast was easier to see now.Back then, when boxing, Luffy had...really been holding back, hadn’t he.  

 

He’d been smiling during his match.And he wasn’t smiling now.

 

The look in Luffy’s eyes was serious and kind of fucking crazy, and every hit he delivered to Guy One made Usopp kind of flinch a little.  

 

Sanji and Zoro stepped away from Guy One.They didn’t need to do anything anymore.  

 

Luffy’s rage was evident, and the strength and brutality of every single punch and kick was fucking blatant, and, fucking shit, honestly...it was a little goddamn frightening.

 

Guy One managed to barely put his arms up in defense before Luffy dealt the final blow, striking him upside his chin with the gun still clutched tight in his hand, knocking the giant attacker unconscious.  

 

Er.Probably...Probably unconscious.  

 

He could be fucking dead, after that.  

 

Everything was very, very quiet for a few seconds.  

 

The sound of Luffy and Sanji and Zoro’s heavy breathing filled what was otherwise a _very_ heavy silence.

 

And when Luffy looked up, he seemed to realize everyone was staring at him.

 

He opened his mouth, like he was going to speak, but no words came out.

 

Usopp didn’t know what the hell to say.  

 

His mouth was still on fucking fire, though.  

 

“Zoro—“ Chopper said suddenly, pushing past him and Nami.“Is your face okay?” 

 

“Yeah,” Zoro said, blinking a few times, looking away from Luffy and down at Chopper.  

 

“Ugh, no it’s not,” Chopper returned, stepping closer, pulling Zoro by the front of his shirt to get him to lean over—to get face level.  

 

“Then why’d you even ask!” 

 

“Good question,” Chopper mumbled, reaching forward to gingerly touch Zoro’s nose.  

 

“Ow, fucker!” 

 

“Don’t be a baby.” 

 

“I’m—!” 

 

Usopp actually smiled just a little at the look on Zoro’s face.Just for a second.And then his eyes trailed towards the two unconscious bodies on the floor of his living room.  

 

Chopper did well to break the silence.But Luffy still looked...not panicked, but.Something.Usopp had never seen that look on his face before.

 

Like he was worried or something.  

 

“Luffy, what should we...” Nami began, her words fading when Luffy looked directly at her.She cleared her throat and gestured to the two guys bleeding on the floor.“What should we do about all this?” 

 

At first, for just a second, Usopp thought it was kind of weird for Nami to be asking Luffy for directions, like he’d know what to do in this kind of situation.  

 

“You guys should probably just, uh, leave for a little while.I’ll take care of it,” Luffy replied.  

 

And everyone was looking at Luffy again.  

 

Nobody said anything for a few seconds.  

 

What the fuck.

 

“It’s really messed up that this happened, you know?” Luffy said, looking back down at the beaten and unconscious body crumbled on the floor next to him.“They came in here with a gun, even.And I couldn’t just—I mean—that could’ve been really bad.”

 

Usopp initially hadn’t understood why Nami had asked Luffy what they should all do, but as the seconds slipped by, he began to realize...that kind of made sense, didn’t it.Somehow.

 

And it wasn’t like they could call the cops.Luffy had beaten these guys’ faces in with an actual gun.Maybe an illegally-owned firearm.Probably.And it wouldn’t be so cut-and-dry as just...calling the fucking cops to come clean up this mess.No.No, this was...This was pretty bad in and of itself.Wasn’t it.

 

Usopp watched Luffy look down at the gun still in his hands, and he pushed the little button that released the magazine and—of course, the gun hadn’t even been loaded.  

 

It was fucking weird, watching the way Luffy knew how to handle a gun like that.  

 

“Yeah.You’re right, yeah, we’ll get out of here for a while,” Sanji said suddenly, snapping everyone out of their thoughts, Usopp included.Digging in his pockets, Sanji walked around the counter/bar, and he grabbed a kitchen cloth and a bottle of water from the fridge and stuck a cigarette in his mouth and started walking towards the door.  

 

And, silently, everyone else just... started moving without speaking.They followed Sanji towards the door.  

 

All except Luffy.  

 

Usopp went to jog up the stairs, pointedly _not_ looking at Guy One or Guy Two.He dipped into his bedroom and grabbed his car keys off his dresser.And when he came back downstairs, he saw Luffy still standing there.And Usopp paused on the stairs and watched him for a few seconds.  

 

Luffy was glaring down at the body on the floor, pulling his shitty throw-away flip phone from his pocket, and he looked pissed as _hell_.  

 

He turned when he pressed the phone to his ear, towards the hallway—towards the door that led down into the basement—to his bedroom that nobody had ever been inside of.  

 

Usopp walked down the rest of the stairs as Luffy walked down the hall.  

 

And as he passed, just before Luffy reached the door at the end of the hallway, Usopp heard him say in a rough voice, “Hey! Jinbei, listen—“ 

 

Luffy disappeared into the basement and Usopp walked to the front door.  

 

Everyone was waiting for him outside, standing around his locked car.  

 

Sanji was pouring water onto the kitchen cloth he’d grabbed, shoving it at Zoro once it was dripping wet.  

 

“What the hell is this for—“

 

“For your face, _idiot_.How are you this fucking stupid?” 

 

“Yeah,” Usopp cut in, and everyone looked at him.It was dark out, and the stars were out and the weather was pretty nice, actually, and even in the low light, Usopp could kind of see the blank expressions on everyone’s face.“I’d rather you didn’t bleed all over my car.” 

 

“Where are we going?” Chopper asked, standing next to Zoro, looking like he wanted to fuss over him still.  

 

“I was thinking my work,” Nami said, earning the honor of everyone fixing their gaze on her now.  

 

“You wanna _drink_ now?” Usopp asked, even though it honestly didn’t sound like an _awful_ idea.Maybe liquor would make his mouth calm down.He couldn’t believe it still burned the way it did.  

 

“No!Well.Probably not.No, I was just thinking we could park behind the building.Nobody would bother us... and we’re just killing time, right?” she explained.

 

“Well.I guess so.”

 

Usopp walked over and unlocked the doors to his car, and everyone slid in.  

 

The car ride was mostly silent.It only took them a few minutes to get to the bar where Nami worked, and Usopp pulled in the small back parking lot.

 

Everyone got out of the car and paced around and just...God, it was fucking weird.  

 

Nobody knew what the fuck to say.Even still.  

 

There was only the glaring obvious to talk about.Luffy did some crazy fucking shit, and none of them really knew what to make of it.Nobody really... knew what to think of Luffy now.  

 

But fuck if he hadn’t saved their goddamn asses.

 

“Hey, Zoro, I’m gonna...You really need to have your nose fixed within, like, ten days.Or you’re gonna have to wait a really long time to get it fixed,” Chopper said, standing on the tips of his toes, scrutinizing Zoro’s swollen nose.  

 

“It’s fine.”

 

“It’s not fine! If you don’t fix it, it’s gonna wind up looking like Sanji’s.” 

 

“Hey!” Sanji cut in, lighting a cigarette.“Fuck you guys.” 

 

“Can’t _you_ just do it?” Zoro asked Chopper, seemingly taking him more seriously after that remark.  

 

“I would _really rather not._ ” 

 

“But you _can._ ” 

 

Chopper kind of visibly squirmed and said some things about how a real doctor needed to do it, and how there needed to be anesthesia, probably, and he ignored Zoro when he started saying how he couldn’t afford all of that.  

 

“Hey,” Nami said quietly, coming to stand next to Usopp.She spoke under her breath as she said, “So all that shit that just happened...really didn’t have anything to do with us.”

 

“Seems that way,” Usopp replied, folding his arms across his chest while he watched Sanji and Zoro argue above Chopper’s worrying.  

 

“So then what the fuck _was that—“_

 

“I’unno, Nami,” Usopp cut her off, and he realized his voice sounded kind of tired.He tried to speak as quietly as he could.“But Luffy was calling someone when I left the house, so...I don’t know.”

 

His brain was too fried to be putting pieces together now.His whole chest kind of felt hollow and numb from his heart kicking the shit out of it for the past however-long.

 

Nami took a deep breath before she whispered, “But did you see him? I mean, shit.It kind of seems like Luffy’s _kind_ of fucking involved in—“

 

“Maybe he is.Who knows anymore.I saw that shit too, Nami, but...I don’t know.And what if he is? We’re not exactly ones to be talking.” 

 

Nami pursed her lips together and joined Usopp in folding her arms over her chest, watching their three roommates yelling at each other under the street lamp.“I guess you have a point.” 

 

“Yeah.But.You know, the night wasn’t a _total_ bust.” 

 

Nami looked over at him.“Uh.” 

 

Usopp smiled just a little bit.“Sanji still has to cook for me for a week.” 

 

Nami snorted and rolled her eyes.  

 

They hung around the back parking lot for maybe an hour, or a little longer.And they got Zoro’s face cleaned up.His nose did look bad, and he had two black eyes, but...Well, he’d recover.  

 

When they finally drove back to the Sunny, everyone kind of fell quiet again on the ride there.  

 

And when they walked inside, everything looked...like nothing had ever happened.And Luffy was nowhere to be found.  

 

And still, nobody said anything.  

 

 

* * *

 

 

Tucked away somewhere at the back of the science and engineering building, Franky had an office.But he honestly never used the thing, except in those super rare moments he needed to have a particularly private talk with a student.And even then, he'd usually just suggest they grab a coffee somewhere else.If that cramped and tiny little office made Franky's skin crawl, he could only imagine how uncomfortable it made everyone else feel.

 

Walking through the creaky double-doors that led to the office wing of the liberal arts building—where Robin’s office was—had pretty much the same oppressive feeling he expected. 

 

The scent of toner and mildew more or less backhanded him in the face. And he almost had to squint at the overly bright fluorescent lights. Not a window in the place. Eugh. 

 

Franky shoved his hands in his pockets as he walked and tried not to stare at all the administrative assistants he was passing, but it was hard, okay, because they only had these little half-walls instead of real cubicles, and he could see all the empty cans of soda and half-eaten granola bars sitting out on their desks, and it was kind of like a car accident where he wasn’t _trying_ to look, but. He looked. 

 

It went both ways, though. As Franky headed towards Robin’s office, he could feel more than a few eyes on him. Well. He was used to drawing a little attention. 

 

Robin’s door looked just like the rest of them, with a cheap plastic name plate and everything. 

 

Franky paused in front of it for several seconds before he craned his neck forward and pressed his ear against the door, trying to figure out if he could hear anyone speaking over the sound of copiers and squeaking chairs and heavy keystrokes. 

 

“She’s got someone in there,” a woman’s voice called from behind him, answering the question he probably should’ve just asked. 

 

Franky spun around, quickly straightening up. “Oh, okay, thanks! I’ll, uh—I’ll wait my turn, then.” 

 

“You can sit, if you want,” the woman behind the half-wall said, pointing at one of the old plastic chairs sitting right outside of her... administrative station. 

 

“Great, thanks,” Franky said, hesitantly taking a seat. Because, man. That had to be distracting, having a rotating group of strangers sitting three feet away from her for a good portion of her workday. And also because it was kind of awkward as hell. 

 

This really wasn’t his scene. 

 

Luckily, it was maybe thirty seconds later that Robin’s door flew open, and a student quickly walked out, eyes fixed to the floor, obviously trying not to make eye contact with anyone over any half-walls.

 

Franky couldn't help but smile a little.He knew that expression _all_ too well.It was the look of someone who had to ask for an extension on something—paper, project, whatever—and had just swallowed all of his pride to do it.Franky kind of liked those kinds of students, actually.The ones who took their assignments so seriously, they got all flustered when they really just couldn't do it in time, for whatever reason.Probably just having too much shit to do.  

 

The student looked so stressed out, Franky kind of hoped Robin had let him have an extra day or two.He made a mental note to ask her about it later.

 

“Oh, you're here already,” Robin said, and Franky's attention immediately snapped to her.

 

“Yeah! I got done super early.I can come back a little later, if you want, though.”

 

“No, your timing is perfect, actually.Why don't you come in for a minute while I finish something up, and then we can go.”She beckoned him in, smiling faintly, and Franky's knees maybe felt a little like jelly as he rose to his feet.

 

It was because of that smile of hers, _damn,_ it made him want to grin like an idiot every time he saw it—which was exactlywhat he was doing.  

 

“Great!You wanna go straight there, or should we kill a little time first?”

 

“Let's go ahead and go,” Robin replied, closing the door.“They supposedly have a good happy hour.”

 

“Yeah, I heard that, too,” Franky said, sitting down in one of the two guest chairs in front of her desk.The same style of plastic waiting chair he'd just gotten up from.

 

Robin took a seat, turning her attention toward her computer screen.  

 

“Sorry, if I could just finish up this email—”

 

“Sure, take your time.”

 

Franky pulled his phone out of his pocket, periodically stealing glances at Robin as she concentrated on her computer screen, her expression stoic and impenetrable. She was probably a badass at poker. 

 

Whenever Franky typed a message to someone, he was pretty sure he was making the same face he'd make if he was speaking it aloud—which probably led to him making a lot of ridiculous faces at his screen, he was suddenly realizing.

 

“Alright, done,” Robin said, pushing her chair back slightly from her desk.“Actually, come here and look at this, you'll like it.It's a project one of my old student's is working on.”

 

He bounced up and quickly slipped in next to her, hunching over a little as he peered at the photos she had just brought up on her screen.

 

“So all of these pictures are actually replicas of famous buildings that are no longer standing, created using 3D printers.”

 

“Oh, cool, I've heard about this!”Franky leaned in closer to the monitor as Robin clicked through the pictures.“Wow, they're detailed.”

 

Glancing at Robin, he saw she had a slight, dreamy smile on her face.

 

 

“Yes, it’s really impressive. This is one she said they just finished,” Robin said, nodding her head faintly at the image on the screen. “It’s called the Porcelain Tower of Nanjing.” 

 

Franky tried to keep his eyes on the screen. He was failing, though. He knew it. 

 

“The tower was torn down in the 1800’s,” Robin added, and she started giving him a brief background of the tower’s history. She sat up a little straighter. And Franky watched her. 

 

She started to ramble a little, her whole face lighting up, smiling through her words, and Franky started smiling with her.She pointed out little details on the screen, and his eyes trailed from her long fingers, to her slender wrists, up her arms—

 

“She helped them analyze historical records to recreate something that’s been gone for over a hundred and fifty years,” Robin finished, barely able to conceal the passion bubbling beneath her cool and even tone. 

 

Franky grinned so wide, it felt like his mouth was hanging open, and he couldn’t help but laugh a little bit. 

 

“I love when our students go on to become badasses,” he said, chewing on his lip through his grin. He couldn’t look away. 

 

Robin spun her chair around to face him fully, and she beamed up at him. “I really do, too.” 

 

Damn, he was in love.

 

He was all too aware of where they were at the moment—at work, at the campus, where they were both employed. And they were in her office, no less, which meant there were probably at least a dozen other professors around who could’ve heard him if he shouted loud enough. 

 

But. Man. He really needed to kiss her. Couldn’t be helped. 

 

He leaned in and pressed his lips against hers, brushing the side of her jaw with one hand before slipping it towards the back of her neck. And as Robin tilted back in her chair, Franky dipped his head. Kissed her a little more. 

 

Just a little bit couldn’t hurt.

 

When he pulled away, their eyes locked, and he probably could've just stayed like that for awhile, even stooped over as uncomfortably as he was.Robin just kind of did that to him—made him lose his sense of time while he took her in.But okay, they would be off campus soon, and unlike him, Robin was actually a pretty model teacher.He didn't ever want to do anything to mess that up for her.

 

He took a step back and straightened out his posture, rubbing the back of his head.

 

“So, uh, I guess we can get going now, since—” 

 

“Franky,” Robin cut him off, standing up and taking a step closer to him, instantly filling up the little bit of space he'd just made between them.  

 

It made him forget to breathe for a second.

 

“Yeah?”

 

She regarded him a moment, her eyebrows slightly raised, that same aloof look on her face she'd had earlier when she'd been typing that email.

 

And then she slipped her fingers into the belt loops of his pants and pulled him slowly him toward her.

 

Holy shit, he still didn't know how Robin went from being cool as hell to smoking hot in like one-tenth of a second.  

 

His heart was already hammering in his chest by the time she kissed him, immediately parting her lips, and Franky's hands returned to her face, cradling them around her jaw.There was so much heat in her mouth, and his body started to get warm, like his blood was slowly coming to a boil. 

 

Robin was really good at flipping some kind of switch in his brain.

 

She threaded her fingers into the waistband of his pants and held him there against her, pressing into his pelvis and his stomach, and, god, he could feel her hands slipping around his waist, trailing down the outside of his thighs, and he could feel her tongue running along his lower lip, and she knew he loved that shit.

 

He moaned into the kiss, kind of loud, but damn, he couldn't help it.He wrapped his arms around her back, holding her, trying to feel as much of her as he could.  

 

Until Robin pulled away a bit, and put her index finger on her lips, like she was trying to hush him.  

 

“Keep your voice down,” she said quietly, and ah, shit, they were in her office, of course he had to keep his voice down.But maybe she wasn't actually upset—the corner of her mouth was actually turned up slightly as she said it, after all.And then she stood up on the tips of her toes and sort of pushed his shirt collar away from his neck, and pressed her lips on his collar bone. 

 

Oh.

 

Franky couldn’t say anything else. He didn’t trust his voice anymore. And as she kissed the side of his neck, she also guided him around, pushing him back against her desk, and he didn’t need a second hint. 

 

He hoisted himself up onto it, and Robin followed, kept her lips on his skin, kissing and biting at his throat, his ear lobe, the side of his jaw—

 

And then he couldn't take it anymore.He grabbed the side of her face, pulling her lips toward him again, kissing her hungrily.

 

Robin moved her hips forward, squeezing her body in between his knees, her hands getting tangled in the back of his hair.Franky was totally pinned against the desk by her, and it made him feel like someone had jump-charged his body.

 

A pile of papers fell on the floor, and Franky tried to turn his head to look, but Robin grabbed him by the jaw and held his head in place, forcing him to keep kissing her, and damn, he wasn't exactly going to fight her on it. 

 

She pressed forward, her chest against his, her knee on the edge of the desk between his legs, and he inhaled a sharp breath when she pushed him back a little more. He could feel her voice vibrate against his lips, the very faint sound making him shudder as she followed her momentum, and she climbed into his lap, pushing him back until he was flat on her desk. 

 

God damn, god damn. 

 

The rest of the world slipped away as she rolled her hips against his, the weight of her body warm and perfect against his, and he groaned against her, his hands slipping up the back of her blouse. 

 

He loved her.He loved her like crazy.

 

Robin had never really said anything to him about his dumb little love confession—but they'd kept on seeing each other.Maybe more than they used to, even.Even on busy days, they tried to squeeze in dinners or coffee breaks.Even just a few minutes with Robin was enough.

 

And that was all he needed—to be able to see her.To talk to her.To touch her.

 

He pulled away for a second and looked at her, and her cheeks were a little bit pink, and she had this look on her face like she wanted to keep kissing him, too.Yeah, these moments, too—when she was suddenly sexy as all hell.

 

He'd never been happier than when he was with Robin.  

 

Franky nearly jumped out of his skin when Robin's office phone started to ring.Even though he'd been the one worried about them being at school, it'd taken about three seconds for him to completely forget himself.  

 

Robin reached for it, sitting up and readjusting her weight on top of his crotch, pinning him in place. 

 

“Hello,” she answered, and her voice didn’t give away even a hint of her current position.

Franky was duly impressed—he wouldn't have trusted his own voice right now. 

 

He could only make out maybe one out of every three words from the caller, but it was enough for him to be able to tell it was someone in the building.He felt like it was high school all over again and a teacher was about to bust him for making out in the bathroom, and heart started beating a little harder. But, it wasn't like anyone was about to barge in there.Probably.

 

“Yes, it's actually an easy fix.Would you like me to come show you?”

 

The caller sounded very relieved.

 

“I'll be there in just a moment.”

 

Robin reached around him to return the phone to its cradle, and then she glanced down at Franky, smiling a little.

 

“My colleague is having a slight network issue,” she said, tracing her finger along his jaw line, letting it linger on his chin for a moment as she leaned down and gave him a soft kiss.“I'll be right back.”

 

Franky's mouth felt dry.  

 

“Teaching history and doing tech support, huh?”

 

“Seems like an unlikely combination, doesn't it?”Robin smirked, finally slipping away from him and off the desk, standing up straight again. He sat up, pressing his weight into the heels of his palms.

 

“Nah, you're the type to wear a lot of hats, I bet.”

 

“Perhaps I should send you over there instead.”

 

“You'd be surprised at how little people actually ask me to fix stuff for them,” Franky laughed, hunching over a little as he sat there. Not exactly in a hurry to get off her desk.He, uh, needed a minute, maybe.

 

Robin walked over to the door of her office and opened the door.“I'll be back in just a moment.”

 

“Alright,” Franky replied, finally easing himself off of the desk as soon as she left, a little relieved she'd closed the door behind her.Geez, this really was like high school all over again.

 

He was about to return to his seat in her guest chair when he noticed the pile of papers he'd knocked down. 

 

“Oh, shit,” he murmured, bending over to start picking them up.

 

They'd sort of spread all over the place instead of landing in a neat pile, so it was hard to see what order they'd originally been in.Damn.He looked at them, trying to figure out what went together, feeling really guilty that he'd messed up her tidy desk.  

 

One sheet of paper clearly didn't belong to the rest, so he started to set it aside, but the first couple of lines caught his eye, and before he knew what he was doing, he'd started reading.

 

His stomach started sinking as his eyes raced down the page.

 

It was an offer letter.Like, a job offer.It'd been quite awhile since Franky had gotten one himself but—there wasn't anything else it could be.

 

And damn, it was a good one, too.A _really_ good one.  

 

The salary alone was astounding.Definitely way more than what she was making here.Even factoring in that Robin's salary was undoubtedly significantly higher than his own, it was a lot.Like, more than anyone at the whole university made.  

 

But it didn't stop there.The offer included the usual benefits, sure.Stock options.Travel reimbursement—with a per diem that was like three times what the university paid, not that they had business travel very often.Even a stipend for living expenses, which was more than enough to cover rent and then some.

 

But the line that really made his stomach lurch was the one about paid moving expenses.Because it wasn't talking about moving to the next city over, or to the other end of the state.

 

The job was almost three thousand miles away.

 

The acceptance line still wasn't signed, but... man, what a great offer.Plus, the first paragraph mentioned something about how they'd adjusted some of it in light of Robin's requests.That meant this wasn't the first time they'd approached her—she'd been _negotiating_.Which sounded exactly like something Robin would do, too.

 

It probably wouldn't be long before she signed it, huh.

 

With slightly unsteady hands, he snatched up the rest of the fallen papers and lined them up, careful to place the offer letter at the back of the stack before he tossed them back on top of Robin's desk.

 

A wave of guilt passed over him as he sank back into the chair facing Robin's desk, hunching his shoulders forward.Shit, he shouldn't have read so much.Shouldn't have read it at all, if he'd been thinking.It was just, Franky had always been a really fast reader—and the part of his brain that recognized he was totally breaching Robin's privacy just couldn't get a message to the speed-reading part of his brain fast enough.  

 

The more he thought about it, the worse he felt.He might as well have started going through her text messages or emails or something.Wasn't any better or worse than what he'd just done, reading her mail like that.

 

Franky tried scrolling through some articles on his phone as he chewed on his bottom lip, waiting for Robin to come back.  

 

As soon as the office door flew open, Franky nearly jumped to his feet, puffing his chest out a little as he smiled at her.

 

“Ready to go?” Robin asked, reaching for her coat, which was hanging on a little hook on the wall.

 

“I am if you are!” he boomed, maybe talking a little louder than he'd meant to. He realized his hands were clenched into fists at his sides, and he relaxed them.

 

“Great, let's go.”  

 

Franky followed her, and she turned back to look at him as she asked, “Do you want to just ride together?"

 

“Sure,” Franky said.

 

“I'm parked in the lot outside.Are you near your building?”

 

“Yeah.”

 

“I'll drive, then, and drop you off at your car later.”

 

Franky cleared his throat and smiled. “Alright.”

 

A minute later, he realized Robin was no longer walking with him when she called out from somewhere behind him.

 

“Franky?”

 

“Hm, what?”He spun around.

 

“This is my car.”

 

Franky swallowed and stood there, lagging for a second. And then he took a deep breath, and he laughed. 

 

“Dunno what I was thinking,” he smiled, shaking his head a little as he backtracked over to her passenger side door. 

 

Spending time with Robin had always been perfect. And tonight was no different. He had a super great time, and all too soon, she was dropping him off next to his car, and he was sliding behind the steering wheel and shifting into drive. 

 

He barely even recalled the drive home. 

 

There were a dozen different projects he wanted to work on, but when he got back to his apartment and closed the door behind him, he just… stood there. 

 

His eyes drifted over the interior of his home, shifting his weight from one leg to the other. 

 

He raked his hands through his hair as he walked to his fridge and grabbed a can of Coke. He popped the top and walked over to the island in the middle of his kitchen, taking a single sip before setting the can down on the countertop. 

 

It really was an incredible offer. 

 

There was no way she wasn’t going to take it. 

 

She wasn’t stupid.

 

And it wasn’t like she had anything tying her to this place. In fact, she’d told him before that she’d wound up at Sabaody more or less on a whim. There was no reason why she shouldn’t upgrade. 

 

He wanted her to be happy. She deserved to be happy. She deserved that job offer. 

 

Franky wondered if he had anything to do with her wanting to leave. 

 

Rubbing the back of his wrist over his mouth, Franky leaned against his kitchen counter, staring at the green recycling bin sitting on the floor just in front of him. 

 

Robin had specifically told him she wasn’t interested in anything serious, hadn’t she. And then, right after she’d told him that, he’d just fucking blurted out his feelings to her anyway. 

 

And since it’d been okay after that — since nothing had really changed between them — he’d just assumed everything was okay. But. What if he’d screwed all that up. 

 

God damnit.

 

He had a feeling she was going to take the offer. And he had an even stronger feeling that, if she moved, he’d probably never see her again. 

 

Franky stood alone in his kitchen, his can of Coke forgotten beside him. His entire apartment was silent, aside from the sound of a clock ticking in his living room. 

 

He closed his eyes, and he took a deep breath, rubbing his face and his eyes and pushing all his hair back again. And then he took two steps forward, grit his teeth, and he kicked his recycling bin across the kitchen, and he watched it crack against the far wall.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Several days passed.  

 

Okay, really, it’d only been, like, two days total since they’d seen Luffy, but it felt like fricking ages in Nami’s mind.

 

After that night—after they’d all gotten back to the Sunny and realized Luffy had vanished along with the two guys he’d laid the fuck out—along with the blood he’d spilled, and the gun he’d taken from them—after all that, Nami and Usopp and everyone all sort of sat around in a lingering communal daze until finally going to bed.  

 

And nobody had brought it up since.Almost like they couldn’t.  

 

Nami had tried calling Luffy late that night, but his phone wasn’t turned on.She’d tried again the next afternoon, too, and gotten the same result.  

 

She didn’t even know if she had the correct number for him anymore, it changed so much with how often he replaced his shitty flip phones that he bought from the drug store down the street.  

 

It wasn’t weird for Luffy to be gone for days at a time.Everyone who lived at the Sunny was used to that.But now...Now, his absence certainly felt different, to say the least.  

 

Luffy disappearing for extended periods of time at random, switching phones once a month, coming home looking like he’d rolled down a mountain, leaving again at the most ridiculous hours—that shit, and _all_ the shit they never questioned, felt a lot fucking different now.  

 

Nami didn’t know exactly what the hell to make of everything, and she didn’t know how her roommates felt about it.Not even Usopp, of all people.  

 

But she didn’t want to assume anything.  

 

And.And she just wanted to see Luffy.She wanted to talk to him.

 

And, truthfully, judging by the current state of the other Thousand Sunny tenants, it was probably safe to assume they all felt something similar.  

 

Everyone was spread out on the couches and the love seat in the living room, except for Sanji, who sat perched on one of the stools by the counter/bar, chain smoking and reading through one of his school textbooks.  

 

And nobody was saying jack shit.  

 

It was the first day of spring break, actually.Which kind of felt surreal in and of itself.  

 

With all the shit going on in everyone’s life—between committing grand theft auto, breaking into the world of underground boxing, dealing with obvious depression, trying to become a child doctor, and finding out two nights ago that their happy-go-lucky and very carefree roommate could’ve probably easily _killed_ two men twice his size with his bare fists if he wanted to...God.  

 

Spring break kind of lost its magic and sense of relief.  

 

Nobody really said anything for a long time, sitting around the living room, letting one of Luffy’s alien DVDs fill the empty space that the silence between them created.And even that felt weird.They were usually so damn loud when they were all together.  

 

Nami was on the end of the long couch, both of her feet shoved under Usopp’s thigh while she scrolled through her phone, the words _what even is my life anymore_ floating around her head when, out of all of them, it was Chopper who finally and suddenly broke the silence.  

 

“Hey.Uh.Do you guys wanna throw a spring break party?” 

 

“Holy shit, did I really just hear Chopper suggest we throw a party,” Sanji said to his textbook before taking a drag of his cigarette.  

 

Nami clicked the screen on her phone off and asked, “When?”

 

Chopper shrugged from where he was stretched across the short couch.“Um.Now? Er, tonight, I guess?”

 

“Honestly,” Usopp said slowly, looking over at Chopper, “I wouldn’t...necessarily _mind_ getting stupid drunk tonight.” 

 

Chopper smiled.“Yeah?” 

 

With his legs thrown over the armrest of the love seat, Zoro took a sip of his beer and said, “Yeah, I could get behind that.”

 

“Well that’s in character, at least,” Sanji muttered to his textbook.  

 

Zoro craned his neck and glared at Sanji’s back.“Says the prick in a long term relationship with box wine.”

 

“Fuck off, you stupid—“

 

“Let’s do it,” Nami said, cutting Sanji off and sitting up straighter.“We don’t have shit else to do tonight.Right?” 

 

Nobody argued.  

 

And then, after a few seconds, Zoro snorted.“What else can we do, really.” 

 

So.That was that.  

 

Chopper started tidying up the house, which Zoro pointed out as stupid since the place was gonna get wrecked anyway, which Chopper ignored, and Usopp took some money from everyone and dragged Zoro along to pick up a few bottles of liquor, and Sanji and Nami busied themselves with sending out a couple of mass party invitation texts.  

 

And just like that, everyone was in motion again.

 

“Hey,” Nami said to Chopper in kind of a quiet voice while everyone else was sort of scrambling to get ready and prepare themselves for the imminent onslaught of people.“Why’d you wanna have a party?” 

 

Chopper shrugged.  

 

“Oh c’mon,” Nami said, nudging her foot against his.“Spill it.”

 

“I dunno,” Chopper replied, his hands going to his pockets, and in that moment, he seemed too tired and too worn and too genuine for someone who was only eighteen years old.“I just thought...I don’t know.I want Luffy to come home.And since none of us can reach him, I thought that, uh, if there was a big party at his house, maybe he’d hear about it.And maybe he’d show up.”

 

“Oh.” Nami pursed her lips together and stared down at Chopper.And he looked back at her like he was unsure if maybe he’d said something wrong.And then Nami grabbed him, and she pulled him into the tightest hug, wrapping her arms over his shoulders and squeezing him against her chest.“You are so _fucking_ cute, you stupid freckled little baby genius.” 

 

“Nami, hey—!“ Chopper started, his voice muffled.  

 

“I want him to come home, too,” Sanji said as he walked past them on his way to the kitchen, “Do I get a hug?” 

 

“You get to make us all drinks,” Nami replied over her shoulder, and she saw Sanji smile before he disappeared behind the counter/bar.

 

He really outdid himself on the cocktails that time.He made one for everyone, preparing each drink in a way that he thought each tenant would like, obviously, and it was kind of weirdly similar to a mom preparing lunch for her kids to bring to school, which made Nami smile as she sipped her _fucking delicious_ drink through a red straw.  

 

It was also weird how something like throwing a last minute party and getting drunk and stupid together was routine enough—familiar enough—to bring everyone at the Thousand Sunny back to their status quo.Things were starting to feel slightly normal again.Like they were all...back to being _them_ again.

 

There was only one thing missing.  

 

For a few minutes, everyone found themselves in that weird state of lingering that went on when you were waiting for something to start, for the _thing_ to happen, where you couldn’t do anything else except kind of stand there and exist slightly on edge and let the seconds tick by.  

 

“Hey, let’s—let’s do a shot together,” Nami said suddenly, and everyone in the living room looked up.“You know.Before a bunch of strangers drink all our liquor.Also because why the hell not, c’mon.” 

 

Sanji grabbed a bottle of honey whiskey from the back counter and smiled at her.“Five pre-game shots, coming up.” 

 

They all gathered around the counter/bar, and Sanji passed a drink to each one of them, and they held their mismatched shot glasses up together in a wordless cheers, and after they tapped their glasses against the counter/bar in a salute to the Sunny, just before they brought their drinks to their mouths in unison, the front door suddenly swung open.  

 

Everyone turned real quickly, before they could even get their drinks in, mentally preparing for a large group of strangers, or their landlord, or, honestly, it could’ve been fucking anybody at that point in their lives, but—it was Luffy.  

 

He stood in the doorway, hand still on the doorknob, and the rest of them stood around the counter/bar, and for maybe two long seconds total, nobody said anything.And then—

 

“Hey!” Chopper shouted, a huge grin on his face.“You’re home!” 

 

And after a split second, Luffy dropped his hand from the doorknob and completely matched Chopper’s expression, smiling with his whole face.“Yeah! I am.” 

 

And that was that.It was like a huge mental and collective sigh of relief.Nami could literally feel the pressure in the air change.  

 

“We’re having a spring break party!” Chopper added.  

 

“Really?” Luffy raised his eyebrows, shutting the door behind him, still smiling so wide.“When?” 

 

“Like, right now, pretty much,” Chopper replied.“We’re all about to do a shot together.”

 

“Yeah.Come do one of these with us,” Sanji said, already filling an extra glass.  

 

“Okay!”

 

And with Luffy standing there, raising his shot glass with the rest of them, it felt, in that moment, like maybe everything could go back to normal.Like everything could wind up being okay, in the end.  

 

“Oh, wow, Zoro,” Luffy said, trying not to laugh already, “Your face looks _awful_ , you look like _shit_ —“

 

“Asshole.” Zoro wrinkled his nose and seemed to immediately regret the action.  

 

“I think it suits him,” Sanji said while he opened a new bottle of wine.He smiled at the look Zoro gave him.“What! You look good just like that—“

 

“Fuck you, at least I’ll get better.You’re stuck with your ugly face forever.” 

 

Nami snorted into her cocktail that she’d started chasing her shot with.Zoro really did look terrible.His nose still looked pretty messed up, and the bruises around his eyes had only gotten more purple and angry-looking over time.  

 

Well.His face did end up looking a lot better than the other two guys, in the end.  

 

Jeez.

 

The thought kind of rocked Nami back to reality, and she glanced over at Luffy.  

 

She wondered if anyone else had thought anything similar just then.  

 

“If people are about to be here,” Luffy said, wiping his mouth after taking another quick shot, “I’m gonna go change my clothes and junk.I’ll be back up in a minute!” And he disappeared again, down the hall and into the basement.  

 

Nami’s eyes shifted around, and she realized everyone had watched him go, and they were all kind of stuck still staring down the hallway.  

 

“Fuck,” Sanji said after a beat.“This is...” He glanced at the rest of them.“This is weird.Right?”

 

Nami almost couldn’t believe someone said it.Finally.  

 

Nobody answered him right away.  

 

“Whatever.He’s Luffy.It’s fine,” Zoro said, like that could just explain away everything.  

 

Although, nobody argued with him, either.  

 

“I’m glad he’s back, either way,” Usopp said, reaching for the cocktail Sanji made him earlier.  

 

“We all are,” Nami added, letting her shoulders fall a little.“It’ll be okay, either way.Like Zoro said.He’s Luffy.” 

 

Whether or not that was enough didn’t matter, because they all heard the loud knock at the front door, and as soon as that door was open, it was like releasing a dam, and people just started pouring in.  

 

Nami was actually kind of impressed that so many people were showing up when she and Sanji were the only ones to send out invitations, but, shit, that was how college parties worked, wasn’t it.She’d certainly learned that life lesson by then, at least.  

 

But it was good.It was loud, and it was distracting, and it was a relief to be surrounded by people and conversations that she didn’t have to lead, that she didn’t have to think about, that didn’t require dwelling on life-altering decisions and breaking the law.Or, god fucking forbid, school.

 

She drifted for a while.  

 

The more people drank, the more they talked, and the _louder_ they talked, until everyone in the damn house was doing that thing where they were yelling at each other instead of just speaking.  

 

Usopp and Chopper were both sitting on the floor, immune to the sea of people flooding around them, messing with this fancy set of turntables someone had apparently set up on the coffee table.Which was kind of funny.They were both the resident science geeks at the Sunny, weren’t they.  

 

“Hey, DJ Dorklord,” Nami said, walking up to Usopp and handing him a new drink because she was such a good friend, “Do you have weed?” 

 

“Yeah, it’s upstairs, you know where it is—“

 

Nami made a big show of groaning.“That’s all the way _upstairs_ , though.”

 

“I’m not getting it for you, I have important DJ business to attend to,” Usopp replied, stealing the big headphones from Chopper.Nami wondered where the owner of the fancy turntables they were messing with had disappeared to.  

 

“Rude,” Nami sighed and spun around, scanning the crowd.  

 

Sanji and Zoro were standing in the kitchen, arguing by the looks of it.And Nami turned and walked in the other direction.Although, truth be told, she was glad to see them actually speaking again.  

 

She wandered towards the stairs, her little plastic red cup in hand, almost empty once more.  

 

She could’ve gone to grab Usopp’s weed, but.She didn’t actually really care about getting high.  

 

And she could’ve interrupted the domestic spat in the kitchen and gotten Sanji to make her another drink, but.She didn’t really care about that either.  

 

So she sat on the stairs that led up to the upper floor and swirled the melty ice cubes around in her cup.  

 

She didn’t know how long she sat there like that.

 

“Hey!”

 

Nami looked up, and she realized Luffy was standing right in front of her, smiling and holding two drinks—one in each hand.  

 

“Hey,” she returned, and he handed her one of his drinks and sat down next to her on the same step.“Where’ve you been?” 

 

“Oh—turns out I know almost everyone here, actually,” he said, tilting his head and scratching the top of it.“I was just saying hey to everybody.” 

 

“I’m deeply unsurprised,” Nami replied, setting her old drink to the side and nursing the new one.It tasted god awful.So Luffy had made it himself.“You _do_ have a lot of friends.”

 

And the usual smile that Luffy wore plastered on his face faded just a little as he said, “I guess.”

 

Nami stared him down, and when he didn’t say anything else, she repeated, “You guess?”

 

“Yeah.Well.I dunno.I mean, yeah, I _know_ all these people, but.They’re my friends, totally, but most of them don't really know me.You know?” he explained, finally meeting her eyes.  

 

Nami paused, her eyes trailing to the floor in front of her.Luffy had always been so direct in so many ways.And in other ways, he was anything but.  

 

“I see what you mean, yeah,” she said after a few delayed seconds, half lost in her own thoughts.  

 

“ _You_ guys are my friends,” Luffy added in, slowly rotating the plastic cup in his hands.He tapped the edge of it with his finger a few times before he said anything else, and when he did speak again, his voice was kind of...quieter than what Nami was used to hearing, coming from him.

 

She looked back over at him in the delay of his hesitation.  

 

He met her eyes.“...Right?”

 

“Luffy,” she said, her words kind of riding her voice as her breath slipped away from her lungs.“I—yeah.Yeah, of course.Of _course._ ”

 

And the smile that grew on Luffy’s face was as genuine as she’d ever seen it.  

 

“Good,” he replied, taking a long drink after that.  

 

And for a moment, they sat without saying anything, watching the crowd and sipping their drinks together.  

 

“Hey—you know that, no matter what, we’re going to be your friends, right?” Nami asked.  

 

It just felt like one of those things that suddenly needed to be said.

 

She watched his face.She watched the way it changed a little, and the way he wouldn’t look at her, and the way his lips pressed together a little harder, and the way he gripped his drink a little tighter.And then, finally, he said, “You really mean it?” 

 

“Damn right,” Nami smiled, and she elbowed him a little, feeling him rock sideways a bit when she pushed.  

 

“That’s—awesome.” He grinned down at his drink, big and open and unabashed.  

 

Sitting next to him, watching him smile and kind of hiding his face, Nami couldn’t help but want to hug him, or yell at him, or _something._ She...she was kind of starting to get it.  

 

She pushed him again, hard enough that he bumped into the wall, and he swatted back at her.  

 

She laughed.Because it was funny.He felt kind of small, next to her, letting her push him around.Almost like she could beat him up if she wanted.He was nearly her size.He was only a couple inches taller than her.And yet, after what’d happened a couple nights ago, and after everything she’d seen—she knew what bullshit that whole image really was.  

 

Nami thought about what he’d just asked her—checking to make sure everyone at the Sunny...still wanted to be his friend.And she tried not to frown.  

 

She was starting to get it.  

 

And she wanted to understand.All of it.

 

"Where the hell are you from?" Nami asked suddenly.

 

"The midwest, actually."

 

"So you grew up in hell, basically."

 

Luffy laughed outright at that.

 

“So what brought you out here?” Nami continued.  

 

Luffy’s laughter quieted down. “I…” he trailed off, blinking a few times. “Came to see my grandpa.”

 

She watched his mouth shift, chewing the inside of his cheek while his eyes followed the big crowd in front of them.  

 

“Yeah? He’s the dean of the school, right?” 

 

“Yeah.”

 

Nami paused.And then she asked, kind of carefully, “Do you and him spend much time together?” 

 

Luffy laughed again, but it was a different sort of laugh this time.“Nah.He’s not really like that.” 

 

“But you came all the way out here just to see him?” 

 

Luffy was still smiling as he replied, “Yeah, well, he wasn’t too happy with me when I got here.” 

 

“Why?” 

 

Luffy tapped his plastic cup a couple times again.“He wanted me to make some different decisions, I think.Like, uh.In life.” 

 

“Like what?” 

 

Still watching all the people floating around in front of him, Luffy got that look on his face like he was deep in thought, which was a fucking weird expression for him to have in general.And then, finally, he said, “A lot of stuff.” 

 

“What, like not going to school?” 

 

Luffy snorted and replied, “There’s that, definitely, yeah.” 

 

When he didn’t add anything else, Nami considered a few options and decided to ask, “Is that not all?” 

 

He looked like he maybe had something to say, but in the end, Luffy just looked over at her and smiled a weird sort of smile and shrugged a little.  

 

“Luffy,” Nami said, and she took a sip of her drink, and then she worked up the nerve to finally say it, to voice what’d been on everyone’s mind for the past couple days—since they’d all known him, really—asking him at point blank, “You’re not really just some underground fight club boxer, are you?” 

 

“Heh,” Luffy almost laughed, and then he took a drink of his shitty cocktail, and he looked back out at all their house guests wandering around, and he pulled his mouth to the side, getting that deep-thought look on his face again, and then, apparently coming to some conclusion, he took kind of a deep breath and said, “Nah.”

 

“So then what the hell do you _do?_ ” Nami followed, and her chest felt a little tight, like she was getting anxious over this whole thing as she asked, “Who _are_ you, really?” 

 

“I’m...” he trailed off, and he huffed to himself.“I’m just Luffy.That’s all.”

 

“And you always will be.” Nami met his eyes again.“And nothing will ever change that.” 

 

He didn’t say anything.  

 

“I’m your friend, Luffy. Not just another person walking around here who barely knows you. Right?” 

 

“Right.”

 

“So I wanna know your story,” Nami said, leaning back against the wall of the stairwell.“I wanna know you.”

 

“Well,” Luffy said, and he looked back down at his drink for a second.And then he smiled, looking back up and connecting with her eyes again.“Okay.I’ll tell you.”

 

“Yeah?”

 

“Yeah.”He stood up, rolling his shoulders a couple times.“But you’re gonna have to walk with me.I can’t talk that much without walking around.”

 

Nami grinned, and she rose to her feet and stood next to him.“Fair enough.”

 

She trailed behind him while he started wandering aimlessly, weaving through people and talking over his shoulder at her.  

 

“So, uh, I had two _really_ good friends growing up.They were basically my brothers,” he began.“We thought of ourselves as brothers, anyway.I mean.Yeah.We were brothers.”

 

Nami nodded and sipped her drink and didn’t interrupt.  

 

“One of them moved away when we were all still pretty young.And the other one died almost five years ago.” 

 

Luffy told his story with as few words as possible in some spots, and in others, he kind of started to ramble.He didn’t go into detail about a whole lot, though, and he kind of jumped around his own timeline.He was actually kind of awful at telling stories, especially his own, it seemed, but Nami was able to piece everything together, she was pretty sure.  

 

She followed him around the house, and slowly, the picture became clearer.  

 

One of his brothers moved away, and Luffy lost contact.He never saw him again after that.And after his other brother died when they were both still in high school, Luffy stopped going entirely and dropped out.  

 

From the sound of it, Luffy and his brother were both kind of delinquents, although Luffy insisted on how _cool_ his brother was, and how _badass_ , and all this other shit, a stupid grin on his face as he recounted a few memories of them together, and the trouble they got into, or barely escaped from.  

 

He didn’t say how his brother passed away.Just that he died when Luffy was seventeen.

 

“I was all alone after that,” Luffy had added with this weird conversational tone.  

 

And so, following all that, he’d apparently managed to mostly hitchhike his way across half the country with what little money he had to his name in an attempt to reach his grandpa, Garp, because, “He was the only family I had left, you know, so, uh...Well, I just wanted to see him! So I decided to go see him.”

 

However, Luffy kind of mentioned in a few choice words how he wasn’t really all that great with budgeting and managing his money, which Nami was less than shocked to learn, which had resulted in him completely running out of cash before he ever made it to the college town that Garp and the rest of them all lived in currently.

 

“Couldn’t you call your grandpa and ask him to help you out?”

 

Luffy kind of chuckled and replied, “Yeah, I tried that.He wasn’t very excited to hear I’d dropped out of school and gotten myself into that kind of situation.”

 

Which, by the sound of it, was what led Luffy to winding up homeless and stranded in an unfamiliar city, trying to work shitty jobs for minimum wage at best, and being fired from all of them less than a week after being hired.  

 

“It was so stupid!” Luffy all but shouted as they slipped past a big group of people playing some kind of drinking game.“I did everything they told me to at those dumbass jobs, and everything still got all messed up, like when this deep fryer caught on fire? Nami, it was so nuts, it pretty much _exploded_ , okay, it was actually pretty awesome—but they blamed that on me, too!” 

 

Nami wasn’t surprised to hear that Luffy didn’t excel at menial tasks and taking direction.From the sound of it, he got caught eating half the ingredients at the restaurants where he worked, and he messed up almost every order, apparently, and broke what sounded like a fuckton of dishes at multiple locations, and he was also maybe responsible for exploding a deep fryer, and.Well.Eventually, he stopped being able to get hired anywhere at all, being a greasy, clumsy, homeless teenager in dire need of a shower and some new clothes.  

 

“And then I got _super_ lucky,” he said, pushing open the front door of the Sunny and walking outside, and Nami shivered a little when the cool night air hit her.  

 

“Yeah? What happened?” 

 

“I met Jinbei!” 

 

“Who’s Jinbei?”

 

“Oh yeah, I forgot I never actually introduced you guys.Only Zoro.Anyway, Jinbei’s _really_ awesome, he really helped me out a lot back then.I pretty much owe him my life.” 

 

As they walked down the stairs of the front porch and out to the sidewalk, Luffy explained how he’d met Jinbei in the first place.He made it seem so serendipitous and lucky, and, honestly, from the sound of it, it really was exactly that.  

 

Luffy had been at a point of desperation.He hadn’t eaten in several _days_ , and he hadn’t slept inside for an even longer stretch of time, and he didn’t go into detail about it, but from the way he was speaking, Nami got the impression that he’d basically been pushed to his wit’s end.  

 

Which.Who wouldn’t be.Nami imagined that trying to succeed and survive in the world they lived in was probably...pretty challenging for someone like Luffy.Especially all on his own.Honestly, the way it sounded, and maybe Luffy did or didn’t realize it, but he really could’ve actually died during that time in his life.Except.He happened upon a chance encounter, instead.  

 

Starving and exhausted and running on whatever fumes born from sheer determination he had left, Luffy was walking down a side street one night in the shittier part of the city he was in, when he happened upon a man being mugged.And he made a quick decision.  

 

Three full grown adults were not enough to stop Luffy, even in his awful condition.  

 

“Did you...Do the thing like you did a couple days ago?” Nami half-asked, knowing he’d understand what she was getting at.  

 

Luffy kept walking down the sidewalk with Nami next to him, and he looked up at the faint stars collected in the dark sky above them.“I beat them up.I stopped them from robbing that guy, and then they pretty much ran off.That was all.”

 

And then he stopped walking and looked down at the little plastic cup with his half-finished cocktail in it that he was still carrying with him.And he smiled as he said, “I asked the guy they were robbing—after I gave him his wallet back, I asked if I could have some of the money in it.” 

 

Nami couldn’t help but grin at that.“Did he give it to you?” 

 

Luffy laughed and shook his head.“Nope.He must’ve been pretty freaked out, too, because he also ran off.Which, screw that guy—I totally saved his ass, he could’ve bought me dinner!” 

 

Nami smiled and waited for him to continue.They stood there, alone on the side of the street, with only a streetlamp at the corner and the moon above them illuminating their faces and their fading smiles.  

 

“But. Jinbei saw the end of it.He saw me give that guy’s wallet back, and while I was sitting there in some alley wondering what the hell I was gonna do next, he walked up and introduced himself.And he more or less offered me a job.” 

 

“Doing what?” 

 

“A lot of different stuff.” 

 

“Like _what?_ ”

 

“Just.Whatever he needs me to do.” 

 

Nami didn’t say anything in response to that for several seconds.Her feelings were mixed.He wasn’t directly answering her on purpose.And she was going to speak up, but, suddenly, Luffy’s words interrupted her thought process.  

 

“I can’t do...a lot of things,” he said.“All the stuff you guys do, like school and shit—I can’t _do_ all that.There’s only one thing I’m any good at.”

 

And Nami’s mind drifted to Luffy trying to fit into society.She thought about him failing at school, and every job he’d ever gotten, and she didn’t know how he’d ever get by and make enough to afford something like a home and groceries and bills every month, or how he’d even keep up on everything without any help, and, for a second, she realized that she couldn’t really blame him.  

 

“So you do what you can do.I get it.And Jinbei’s like your boss?”

 

“Hah! Nah.He’s just...he’s my friend.He’s a really good guy, Nami.He helps a lot of people.That’s, like, what he’s all about.” 

 

“But?” Nami asked, because it really felt like there should’ve been a _but_ at the end of that sentence.  

 

“Uh.But.It’s just not all very legal the entire time.” 

 

“What, so he, like, smuggles immigrants over the border and shit?” 

 

Luffy paused, and then he kind of did this shrugging-nodding gesture, and Nami raised her eyebrows. “Really?” 

 

“He does a lot of different stuff. He just wants to help people.”

 

“And he’s the guy that got Zoro into the fight club boxing thing? Where’s that whole deal fit in?” she asked.  

 

Which, Luffy laughed a bit at that.“Jinbei just really likes boxing.And I do too!But that basement fighting thing doesn’t happen very often.” 

 

“I see.”She looked around the empty street, her eyes trailing back to their house at the end of the cul-de-sac, and she could still hear the music pouring from the Sunny, just slightly.“Is Zoro...That’s over, right?” 

 

“Oh.Oh, yeah—that didn’t have anything to do with me, even.Zoro just wrecked a guy with a big reputation and a _really_ big ego.” Luffy shrugged.“That guy just turned out to be crazy, that’s all.” 

 

“You went pretty crazy there, too, for a minute,” Nami said before she could think better of it—before she could consider how Luffy might receive that comment.  

 

But he nodded.“Yeah.I did.But that guy had a gun, and people like that are nuts, and you guys are my...You’re all my friends.”

 

Nami blinked a couple times.  

 

“Thanks for that, by the way,” she said, her voice quiet.“Who knows what would’ve happened if you hadn’t shown up and flipped shit.” 

 

Luffy didn’t respond for a beat.And Nami couldn’t see the look on his face very well in the dark.But she could hear it in his voice—the way he sounded a little older, or maybe he just sounded his actual age, or whatever, but...he sounded more mature than what she was used to.Which was funny, because all he said was, “Anytime.”

 

They started walking back to the Sunny, and Luffy craned his neck back and guzzled down the rest of his drink.And eventually, before they got back to the party, Nami said, “So you ended up being able to get here in the end.To see your grandpa.” 

 

She could see the new, thin smile stretch across his face.“Yep.” 

 

“And he doesn’t wanna see you because—“

 

“Yeah.”

 

“So why’d you bother coming here anyway? Why still try with him?” she wondered, because they were almost back, and she...didn’t want to miss this chance.

 

They walked a few more steps before he answered.  

 

“I wanted a family again.That was the idea the whole time, I guess.”

 

The air around them felt quieter, like all the background noise of simply existing slipped away, and Nami’s voice was soft when she asked, “So why’d you stay?” 

 

Luffy grinned at her.“I met Brook while he was putting up flyers for the Sunny.”

 

They stood together in front of the Thousand Sunny, still teeming with people and filled to capacity.They stared at the bright happy lion on the front door.And Nami realized she was starting to smile just like Luffy was.They had the same expression on their faces, standing in silence and looking at their home filled with their roommates.Their friends.More than that, even.

 

“So where were you the past couple days?” Nami asked after several seconds, and she saw him dip his head a little.  

 

“I stayed at Trafalter’s.I just thought—maybe it was better to stay away for a little while.”

 

“You know you don’t have to do that anymore if you don't want to, though, right?”

 

Luffy nodded.Still smiling.  

 

“We’re… this is your home. You know?” Nami’s eyes were still on the stupid lion Usopp painted so many months ago.That she loved.“It’s our home. All of us.”

 

“Yeah,” Luffy replied, and his voice sounded lighter, and happier, and more _Luffy_ than it’d been all night.And she was glad.She was relieved, for whatever reason.Probably a lot of reasons.And he probably was, too.She could feel that, at least.

 

“Does Law know about...all of this?” she asked, and she saw him glance over at her with his tiny grin still stuck on his face.  

 

“Yeah, he does.”

 

And Nami matched his expression again.And after that, he turned and started walking inside.And she followed a few steps behind.  

 

She wanted to tell him, she realized, as she stared at his back.She wanted to tell him everything—about her and Usopp and her farm and about Crocodile—the same way he’d just opened up to her.But in the end, his words about wanting a family echoed in her head, and the image of him leaping down a flight of stairs towards a gun pointed straight at him rushed through her mind, and the gravity of everything he’d risked with zero hesitation in order to keep them safe bloomed in her chest, and—

 

She followed him inside, and she said nothing at all.  

 

 

* * *

 

 

With a frustrated grunt, Usopp threw the blankets off of his legs, heaping them in a lump at his feet.He was so tired—so very freaking tired—but his brain just was not letting him sleep.  

 

The last couple of days had been kind of rough.No, they were _definitely_ rough.And bad.And he really wanted to just sleep and _forget_ about it all.

 

Usopp and Nami had been working at their second job for three nights in a row.They'd never done that before, and Usopp really hoped they wouldn't do it again, because his nerves were pretty much shot at that point.

 

He'd been thinking about his comfort zone a lot lately.Usopp had always been a relatively cautious person. The most danger he wanted to have in his life was to maybe ride in a car without a seat belt on for a couple of blocks, or eat an egg salad sandwich from a gas station.So, yeah, he'd pretty much skyrocketed way beyond his danger-threshold in the past couple of months, and he'd almost forgotten what it was like to go for a few hours without his heart racing for no reason.

 

For awhile, he had kept a tally of how many cars they'd stolen in his head, but now it was all starting to blur together.The new count was how many guns had been pointed at him.Or his friends.

 

“Shit,” he muttered under his breath, half-rolling out of the bed as he rose to his feet.

 

He'd never really thought a whole lot about his feelings on guns, but now, he was pretty decided that nope, he did not like them _one bit_ and he hoped he'd never see another one again.His stomach twisted as he realized that was probably impossible.Yep, definitely impossible, because that Crocodile guy or someone working for him was _absolutely_ going to murder them, for sure.Why the hell wouldn't he?He had nothing to lose, he'd probably killed dozens, no, _hundreds_ of people, so what would two more mean?Crocodile had probably lost count of how many people he'd killed already—just like Usopp had lost count of all the cars he had stolen.

 

Even if it wasn't Crocodile, it'd be the police.Yeah, there was _no way_ they weren't going to get arrested one day.In fact, he was surprised it hadn't happened yet.Seriously, how the hell had two total amateurs managed to get by so far?They'd get caught, or pulled over, or something like that, and Usopp was _definitely_ going to get shot when that happened, because come on, even if he didn't have a weapon, even if he listened to everything the police said and put his hands up and laid down on the ground and there was no way he could possibly do anything to anyone—he'd still get shot.  

 

Usopp decided he never wanted to see another gun again in his life.Even if the zombie apocalypse started right that second and someone offered him every single weapon in the whole wide world to choose from, he'd rather use a baseball bat or an axe or maybe a freaking crossbow, just so he'd never have to lay his eyes on a gun ever again.

 

He needed to pee.

 

Usopp reached for the socks he'd thrown on the ground a little while ago and paused.He considered going barefoot.And then he remembered the state of his house, and who lived in it, and he pulled his socks on and left his room.

 

It only took him about three steps outside of his door to hear it—the sound of the shower running.Dammit.He contemplated if he should just go back to bed, or maybe wait in his room a little while until whoever it was got out of there.

 

But as he stood in his doorway for way too long thinking about it, he realized he _really_ needed to pee.And the only other bathroom in the house was the one next to Chopper's room.

 

It was something like one in the morning, but there was no need to worry about making noise as he trudged down the steps, because he could already hear a whole bunch of people down there.He could make out Luffy's shouts and Brook's laugh, and a couple other voices that were kind of familiar.When he reached the landing, he made a bee line to the door at the end of the hall, just hoping nobody would call after him.And thank god, no one did.

 

After he emptied out his bladder and washed his hands, he paused with one hand on the door knob.He probably wouldn't be so lucky trying to head back upstairs, because there was no way to get to the staircase without pretty much staring at everyone in the living room. 

 

Usopp genuinely liked how everyone there always made him feel included.It was great, to feel like he was always welcome, unconditionally and without question.It was just, he was beyond tired, more worn down than he'd maybe ever been in his life, and he wasn't sure how good he'd be at attempting to be social.As he took a deep breath and listened to the cheerful voices through the bathroom door, it wasn't hard to guess that the odds of him getting by without saying anything were zero to none.

 

He barely made it two steps outside when he collided with someone who had just come out of Chopper's room.Which was weird, because Chopper almost never had people in his room.

 

About all he took in during the split second before they crashed into each other was that she was short—like a head shorter than him, at least—and she had long blonde hair, parted straight down the middle.

 

“I'm sorry!” she said, at pretty much the exact moment they slammed into each other. 

 

Usopp's stomach dropped.

 

This was a voice that was permanently etched into his memory.A voice he used to try to make the first thing he heard when he woke up the morning, and the last thing he heard before he fell asleep at night.The voice that belonged to the person who had mattered most to him, until just a few years ago.

 

It was Kaya.

 

Kaya was here, in his house.

 

“What the fuck?” Usopp murmured.

 

“Oh my _god_ ,” Kaya said at almost the exact same time, bringing her hands up to her mouth.  

 

They stared at each other for several very long seconds, her eyes looking larger than ever.Something was different, actually.Usopp squinted a bit, trying to place what it was—probably some kind of make-up, like mascara.

 

The loud _thunk_ that came from somewhere inside of Chopper's room somehow managed to tear Usopp's attention away from the incomprehensible thing that was happening, and he turned his head toward the door just as it burst open and Chopper tripped out of it, barely catching himself before he fell over.

 

As soon as he recovered his balance, he looked over at Usopp, sort of from the side so the whites of his eyes were showing, and he looked totally _freaked._ He was kind of a mess, too, with his fluffy mop of hair looking like someone had rubbed a balloon on it, and his clothes were the sloppiest Usopp had ever seen them.His loose shorts—the ones Usopp was pretty sure he slept in a lot—weren't quite lined up right, and his even looser t-shirt had the bottom seam all tucked under and inside, like he'd pulled it over in his head a hurry—

 

Kaya had just left Chopper's room.  

 

Ah.

 

Usopp almost laughed.  

 

Chopper looked like he was about to faint.

 

“So, uh, how's it going,” Usopp finally said, willing the muscles in his face to stay lax and expressionless, but it wasn't working very well, and the corner of his mouth twitched a bit.

 

Chopper tried to say something, but it took a couple of tries for him to make actual words, and he was gesturing like _crazy,_ like he was trying to fight off a swarm of invisible bees. 

 

“Oh my god, um, Usopp, listen, I'm so sorry, I can explain—” 

 

He looked really ridiculous.And it sounded like he was reading lines right out of a script for a shitty TV drama or something.And—god, this was funny, why was it so funny?

 

Usopp couldn't hold it anymore.

 

He started laughing—like, _hard_ laughing, buckled over with his hands on his knees kind of laughing.His brain kept repeating for him to stop, over and over, but he just couldn't help himself.He didn't even catch whatever else Chopper said, although it wasn't much.He might've trailed off.

 

Okay, wow, Usopp really needed to stop though, this was very crazy of him, but the struggle was _intense_.It took him a couple of attempts before he finally managed to swallow back the belly laugh that still wanted to keep erupting out of his mouth.

Kaya was staring at him with her mouth slightly open, and Chopper looked a little green.

 

“I was in town again as part of my program,” Kaya finally started to explain, a bit hesitantly, “which I think you knew.”

 

“Yeah,”Usopp managed to croak, but shit, talking was hard.  

 

Chopper _had_ mentioned it to him. Another medical convention-y thing.Except maybe this time she wasn't speaking—Usopp couldn't really remember much beyond how much he _one hundred percent_ did not want to go.He'd assumed Chopper was looking for someone to come with him, so Usopp had been worried that he might be guilt-tripped into going anyway, but when Usopp had made a flimsy excuse about why he couldn't make it, Chopper had looked kind of relieved.Which seemed weird at the time.

 

But now it it made _perfect_ sense, and Usopp was so tired, and this was so damn _funny._

 

“I was done with what I needed to do for the day, and those convention centers aren't exactly the best place to have a conversation,” Kaya went on.

 

“And, uh, everything around closed really early, too,” Chopper managed to contribute.

 

“Yes, that's right.So, after trying to figure out where we could go for awhile, Tony suggested we come here.”

 

Holy shit, did she just— 

 

Usopp bit down on his lip.He had to get out of there.

 

“Ah, okay, well I was just coming down to use the bathroom.I've got to go to work early tomorrow, so I'll let you go.”  

 

Usopp stepped past them and hurried toward the staircase without waiting for a response.Kaya might have said something else to him, but he didn't quite catch it, and he _really_ didn't want to turn around.He had to get upstairs like _right now._

 

Luffy, sitting at the counter/bar, caught Usopp's eye right as he got to the staircase.Funny, that was just the thing Usopp had been worrying about like three minutes ago.Suddenly it didn't seem like that big of a deal.He almost laughed again.

 

Luffy waved a hand at him, urging him to come over, but—he really just could not.

 

Usopp shook his head from side to side, pressing his lips together.Normally, Luffy was extremely insistent about getting people to hang out with him—so Usopp was surprised when he gave Usopp a kind of serious look.His eyes drifted to somewhere behind Usopp, back where Kaya and Chopper may have still been standing, for all he knew, and then he gazed back at Usopp again.

 

Then Luffy smiled a little, giving him a quick nod before he turned his attention back to the rest of the room.Even Luffy had picked up on the ridiculously awkward thing that had just happened to him, apparently.

 

He made it to Nami's bedroom door and managed to get inside of her room and close it behind him before he leaned back against it hard, sliding down the wall until he was just sitting on the floor, and after a couple seconds, he started laughing so hard that he was almost crying.

 

Nami, who had been laying on her stomach on her bed, scrolling through her phone or something, raised her eyebrows at him.  

 

“What's so funny?”

 

“You remember Kaya?” he said finally.

 

“Yeah?”

 

“She's here.” 

 

“Oh, like in town?”

 

“Like, downstairs.”  

 

“What?How?”

 

“With Chopper,” he added, a certain inflection in his voice.Usopp closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the door, still smiling a little.  

 

There was a very brief pause before Nami replied, “... _Oh._ ” 

 

“Yep.”

 

“Like, she's _with_ Chopper?”

 

“ _Yep._ ”

 

Usopp started laughing again, crossing his arms over his knees so he could rest his forehead on his forearm.

 

“Are... you upset?”Nami asked when his laughter finally subsided.

 

He wiped his eyes and chuckled again. “Why would I be?”

 

“Because you guys dated for like a hundred years.”

 

Usopp rolled his eyes.“But we broke up a hundred years ago, too.”

 

It really did feel like it'd been that long.At the beginning of their relationship—right before high school—everything was so new and happy.Usopp had probably loved Kaya more than anything else in the entire world back then.She was one of the only people he cared about, and she was probably the only person who really cared about him.He'd thought there was no way he could possibly survive without her.  

 

It was funny remembering all that, now that they'd been apart for so long.

 

There were a lot of signs leading up to it ending, though.The closer they got to graduation, the more obvious it became they were weren't headed in the same direction.  

 

Hell, Usopp didn't even know which direction he was heading in, then or now.He'd just been sort of meandering down a path and taking the steps he thought he was supposed to take, crossing his fingers that someday, he'd land somewhere where he'd be happy.Or at least, be able to scrape by a living.

 

For Kaya, on the other hand, she knew exactly where she was going.For her, that path was a straight line with no turns or detours, and she never faltered for a second.Usopp couldn't even imagine what it was like to have a clear goal in sight. 

 

“Kaya and Chopper are a lot alike, when you think about it,” Usopp said aloud.

 

“You mean beyond the doctor thing,” Nami guessed.

 

“Yeah,” he nodded.“Kaya did the same thing Chopper's doing—well, not _exactly_ the same, but close. Kaya took all these college courses during high school—I forget what it's called, the classes where you get college credits too—”

 

“AP? DE?”

 

“Yeah, uh, I think so.”He couldn't remember what any of those letters meant—it wasn't like he'd ever taken those kinds of classes in high school.“For senior year, she took most of her classes at the junior college.”

 

Nami considered a moment.“So, if she did all that in high school, does that mean she already got her bachelor's?”

 

“Last year,” Usopp nodded.  

 

“Jesus,” Nami murmured.“That _is_ like Chopper, though.I think he told me he's trying to graduate when he's like twenty.”

 

Usopp had heard him say that, too.So there was that.And there was the way Kaya and Chopper talked to each other the very first time they'd met—how even though they were total strangers, they'd been able to talk about all these different things so passionately.Things that Usopp had never really been able to comment on, because they'd just never been that interesting to him.  

 

As he considered it, Usopp realized there were a trillion other small things that probably made the two of them really compatible.But there wasn't really any point in getting into any of them.So finally, he just shrugged and said again, “They're are a lot alike.”

 

Nami hummed, obviously agreeing with him.“You can still be upset about it though.”

 

“I'm not,” he said, leaning his head back against the door again.  

 

“Like, it would be completely okay if it bothered you.” 

 

Usopp closed his eyes and thought it over.But compared to all of the shit that'd been happening to him lately, the idea of Kaya and Chopper being together wasn't really that earth-shattering.

 

“What if it doesn't bother me at all?” he said finally, staring down at the floor.He was so tired, his eyes were starting to hurt.“Is that bad of me?” 

 

“Of course not,” she replied immediately, pulling herself upright.“But it would've been normal to flip out over it, too.”

 

“If I thought Chopper was bad for her, sure, I might have a problem with it.Like, if I saw Kaya walk out of _Sanji's_ room instead of Chopper's...”he trailed off.  

 

“You saw her walk out of Chopper's room?”Nami's eyes widened.

 

“Yeah, uh.She called him Tony.”

 

“Oh my _god_.”This time, it was Nami's turn to laugh.“No wonder you had that look on your face when you came in here.”

 

“Yep.”

 

Once her laughter faded, a sort of comfortable silence slipped over them.Nami stood up and walked over to him, sitting down on the floor right in front of him.  

 

“Are you okay, Usopp?”

 

“What do you mean, am I okay?”The question almost made him laugh again.Even if it wasn't funny in any way.“I'm as okay as you are.Are _you_ okay?”

 

“I'm obviously okay,” she replied reflexively, glancing downward.

 

“Well, me too.”

 

They were most definitely not okay, though.If only term papers and tests and his roommate sleeping with his ex-girlfriend were the only things he had to worry about these days.

 

“We will be okay,” Nami whispered.“We'll be okay one day.”

 

“God, I fucking hope so.”

 

Usopp closed his eyes.He heard Nami shift her position, and she pushed his arms out of the way until she could get to his torso, leaning in and hugging her arms around him.With a sigh, he let his arms rest around her shoulders.

 

Even though the floor was dusty and a little cold, they stayed there for awhile, clinging onto each other.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Zoro had been off work for over an hour, and he was enjoying his fourth beer.  

 

It was one of those warm nights, and all the windows on the bottom floor were open, and, incredibly, nobody else was awake.It was past two in the morning on a Monday night.And, really, this was was more or less prime time for his loud and stupid roommates to come together and get even louder and stupider than usual.  

 

Things had kind of gone back to normal like that lately.Like everything was starting to slide back into place, the way it used to be with all of them.Which was ridiculous, because the past month had been one of the... least normal months of Zoro’s life.  

 

He still had bruises under both eyes, but they were finally starting to look better.And he was supposed to go get his nose fixed in two days.  

 

Sanji should’ve been home a while ago.  

 

He was usually home before Zoro's late shift at the convenience store ended. Lately, it was typical, when Zoro got back to the Sunny, to find Sanji sitting there by the counter/bar with everyone else, drinking wine like the asshole he was, chain smoking and rubbing his face and raking his hands through his hair, letting it stick out in every direction because he hadn’t slept in two days and even that didn’t matter to him.  

 

Stupid fucker.  

 

Zoro was on his seventh or eighth beer—just starting to get comfortable—when Sanji made it back to the Sunny.  

 

Sitting on the couch, Zoro had been listening to the television and staring off into space.Tonight’s documentary was about aliens being mistaken for divine beings in religious texts.He probably knew more about alien conspiracies than fucking business at that point.  

 

He listened to Sanji fight the lock on the front door for a solid minute before unexpectedly triumphing and nearly falling into the living room.  

 

Sanji righted himself quickly, snapping back up, slamming the door shut behind him, his eyes immediately landing on Zoro.  

 

“Go the hell to bed already, fuck, you and your sleeping habits are so goddamn stupid,” he said, kicking off his shoes and dropping his keys on the scuffed coffee table that Zoro had his feet propped up on.  

 

Zoro looked him up and down real quick.“Did you get lost coming home?”

 

“That’s funny as hell, coming from you, isn’t it,” Sanji snorted, already on his way to the kitchen.“I missed the bus, and then I missed it again, and...” he trailed off, sifting through the cabinet.He produced a bottle of wine and a loaf of bread, and he held both items in his hands, looking down at them with an expression like he was doing a big mental debate.  

 

“Did you walk here, then?” 

 

“Why the fuck do you care,” Sanji said suddenly, looking up, setting the loaf of bread back down on the counter.Decision made.  

 

“I don’t,” Zoro replied, watching Sanji uncork his bottle of wine in a matter of a few seconds.His eyes followed Sanji’s hands as he added, “You seem drunk enough already.” 

 

“I’m sorry, I’m pretty sure you had a half-pint for breakfast this morning, if I, uh, remember correctly.Can you shut up? Just shut up, just for a little while.Just let me get back to blacking out, and then I'll go pass out, and, uh, you can stay here and think about your future, or whatever you think about when you sit around with a stupid look on your face.” 

 

Sanji was wavering on his feet.Zoro didn’t bother saying anything as he walked over, full wine bottle in hand, and sat on the opposite end of the couch.  

 

“Did you get drunk at work?” Zoro asked after a few seconds, opening his... ninth? beer.

 

“Extremely.”

 

“What brought that on?” 

 

Zoro didn't actually know why he asked that.

 

“Why does anyone get drunk at work,” Sanji muttered, and he tilted his head back and closed his eyes, and Zoro blatantly watched as he opened his throat and chugged a third of the bottle.An entire fucking third of it.  

 

Sanji belched and let out a long sigh and wiped his mouth and Zoro looked away.  

 

So unlike him.  

 

“I feel disgusting,” Sanji said, and when Zoro finally glanced over again, he could see Sanji smiling a little.  

 

“That so.” 

 

Sanji was pretty goddamn fucked up.  

 

“I should shower.” He let his head fall back against the couch cushion.“Where the hell is everyone?” 

 

Zoro shrugged.“Asleep.” 

 

Sanji closed his eyes.“It’s Monday, right?” 

 

“It was.It’s Tuesday now.”

 

“You know what the fuck I meant.”

 

Sanji’s voice was quiet, and Zoro could see how visibly tired he was.  

 

They drifted into silence and watched the documentary still playing on their old-ass television.Actually, that thing could probably be classified as vintage by now.Sanji kept drinking, and Zoro was nearing the end of his twelve-pack.  

 

They’d been doing this more often lately.Just—the whole coexisting thing.  

 

The more they drank, the more involved they became with Luffy’s DVD, which they discovered was a series and not just one single documentary, and they immediately located the second disk and put it on, and they bickered casually here and there, and they got up to go to the bathroom a lot, and Sanji eventually gave in and ate some of the cold pizza Zoro had found in the fridge and didn’t even complain about it.  

 

Zoro was peeling pepperonis off a slice and eating them like potato chips when Sanji returned from another bathroom trip—how someone so clearly dehydrated could piss so often was beyond Zoro—and he was hardly walking in a straight line, his stupid hair sticking out in twenty different directions.A half-curly mop, ruined by a long walk through the damp night air outside.  

 

Sanji didn’t sit back down on the couch.Rather, he half-stumbled towards the TV and stood next to it, almost shouting at it in a drunken ramble, mocking the transatlantic accent of the current speaker on the documentary who was going on and on about the Nazca Lines, and he still had a piece of pizza in his hand.  

 

Had he stood there in the bathroom, fucking pissing while eating a piece of crappy pepperoni pizza from down the street? Zoro had no idea how old that pizza was.Sanji probably knew that.  

 

It was a good thing their roommates were heavy sleepers.Sanji was speaking—kind of yelling—with his mouth full, using his pizza crust to point at the television, and Zoro wasn’t listening.He could only hear Sanji’s own stupid fucking accent bleeding through in his inebriation.  

 

Sanji turned away from the TV and walked over to the couch, and he sat down abruptly on the coffee table directly across from Zoro, and he looked very serious, and his eyes were very bloodshot.  

 

“So what the fuck, right? I know you don’t believe in God, and I get that, good for you, you know, _atheism_ , so _modern_ —but, uh, okay.Do you, or do you not, think that aliens influenced early civilization? I think it’s fucking stupid made up bullshit, but fuck, right? Fuck.” 

 

Zoro watched Sanji’s lips.He watched him light a cigarette.  

 

“I wonder what Robin would say.I wonder what she thinks.Probably aliens.Probably she loves aliens.Wait.Wait, though.So, alright, do you, or don’t you?”

 

Zoro didn’t know who the hell Robin was.  

 

“Do I what, now?” Zoro asked, his voice deadpanning.  

 

“Aliens and civilizations, I don’t fucking know,” Sanji said, dropping what was left of his second piece of pizza back in the box with finality.He grabbed the bottle of wine in its place.It was nearly empty.  

 

“You’re hammered,” Zoro observed, shaking his own beer can a little to see how much was left in it.Not much.  

 

He’d only seen Sanji this fucked up a couple times, really.Maybe only once.  

 

“Are you not?” Sanji asked.  

 

“Not at all.” 

 

“Well that’s because you’re an alcoholic, Zoro,” Sanji replied, leaning back on the coffee table, his weight on his left hand.  

 

Zoro paused at that.At the sound of his name.And then he glared, because Sanji was one to goddamn talk.“I’m not a fucking—“

 

“Doesn’t matter to me if you are or not.It doesn’t change anything, does it.” 

 

Zoro slid his tongue along the back of his teeth, thinking.Sanji was looking at him with exhausted eyes, running on pure fumes, empty and wired, still full of hollow energy fueled by caffeine and booze and other things.  

 

His knee touched Zoro’s as he leaned over and spoke in his slow and liquidy English, pointing at him, and Zoro could see his hand shaking, which seemed to be something that happened to him when he was past the point of exhaustion and well into near-delirium.  

 

“You’re still you.Probably nothing could change that.” 

 

Zoro looked down at his own lap and Sanji stubbed out his cigarette and stood, stepping around Zoro’s legs, going back to his kitchen.The sound of the fridge opening floated over to Zoro’s ears.  

 

“You want some real food?” Sanji asked over his shoulder.  

 

“What’re you trying to make?” 

 

“I don’t know.I don’t care.Anything.I’ll make anything.I just want to cook.” 

 

Zoro thought to himself for a moment.“Make some cookies.”

 

“ _Ooh_ , yeah.Yes.I will do that.Baking, yes.Okay.Okay, give me a minute, I’ll make some goddamn cookies that’ll fuck you up, they’ll be so good.” 

 

Completely forgotten, Zoro watched him from behind the couch, turning around and sitting on it backwards with his legs tucked under him, his chin resting on the back couch cushion.  

 

In a completely drunken haze, Sanji flipped on the oven to preheat and grabbed butter and flour and a bunch of other shit, stumbling around the kitchen, throwing things into a bowl, and more things into a different bowl, only eyeballing the measurements, and he leaned back against the fridge for balance and whisked his ingredients together while the stupid alien documentary played in the background.Zoro hardly heard it anymore.

 

Sanji formed the dough and rolled it into little balls and placed them—all perfectly equally spaced apart, it looked like—and he used his thumb to make indents in each little clump of dough, and he poured some kind of jam he’d picked up or even made, probably made himself, into the little holes he’d created, licking his fingers on his other hand while he swayed back and forth, and somehow, nothing spilled, he poured perfect amounts of everything, all perfect, all of it was mother fucking perfect.  

 

He threw the tray into the oven and kicked it closed, and he walked around and hoisted himself up on the counter/bar, his legs dangling off the side edge, and he seemed to remember Zoro, and in an episode of completely forgetting himself, he smiled at him.  

 

His fucking lopsided smile, warm and completely disarming.  

 

Zoro flipped back around on the couch and sat on it like a normal human being should, bringing his can to his mouth, and in a few long gulps, he finished his beer and stood up.  

 

“Do you think there are aliens on Earth right now?” Sanji asked as Zoro walked past him to the fridge and peered into it.  

 

“I dunno.” 

 

“Of course you don’t.Were you there when we watched the one made by the BBC?” 

 

Sanji’s speech was getting jumbled a bit.Zoro wondered for a brief moment what Sanji would sound like if he were yelling at him in his mother tongue.  

 

“Maybe.I don’t remember.I think there’s a few different ones like that,” Zoro replied, talking into the fridge.

 

“Do you think Luffy actually believes in all that shit, or, um.Do you think he just, you know, gets off on it?Not, like... well, you know what I mean.” 

 

Zoro pulled one of Usopp’s beers from the fridge because Usopp wouldn’t care.He liked that about him.Opening it, he turned, and Sanji’s eyes were lowered, staring at the floor, and he was smiling a little.  

 

“I don’t know,” Zoro said.  

 

“Luffy... what a fucked up little shit.I love that kid.He...” 

 

Zoro moved to stand in front of Sanji, who looked up at him, trailing off, the smile on his face fading.Zoro took another step forward.  

 

“What’re you doing,” Sanji mumbled, his eyes bouncing from Zoro’s chest to his face.  

 

“I don’t know,” Zoro said again.He took one final step forward, and he pushed Sanji’s knees apart just a bit with the tips of his fingers, holding his drink with just his thumb and forefinger, and he stood there between Sanji's legs, taking a long gulp of his beer before setting it on the counter.And then, finally, he looked at Sanji’s face.It was utterly blank.  

 

Zoro’s hand came to rest atop Sanji’s thigh, and Sanji raised his eyebrows a little at that, studying Zoro’s expression.  

 

“ _Really._ ”

 

Zoro’s eyes snapped back to Sanji’s, refocusing, and he couldn’t read him, couldn’t tell what he was thinking, couldn’t tell what was really going on in his stupid French brain, like always, like fucking always, so he didn’t say anything.Like always.  

 

Almost always.  

 

Rather, he put his hand against Sanji’s chest and pushed, leaning him back, and Sanji wasn’t fighting him at all.Zoro’s hand slid down lean stomach muscles as Sanji laid back against the countertop, and he pushed up Sanji’s shirt and studied all the lines and curves and indents of his abdomen, and the trail of light hair—nearly as blond as on his head—that ran downwards and disappeared beneath his dark trousers.  

 

Zoro put his lips against his stomach, hands going to his hips, and he kissed against sensitive skin while Sanji sucked in a long breath, his chest rising slowly.  

 

Zoro hooked his fingers around the rim of Sanji’s trousers, pulling them down just slightly—as much as they would go before getting too snug to go down any further—and he kissed what he’d exposed, and he licked against Sanji, dragging his tongue, and he maybe bit down just a little near a protruding hipbone, his breath hot against wet skin.  

 

Sanji’s back started to arch.Both of them were silent.  

 

As he kissed slowly against his stomach, Zoro unbuttoned Sanji’s trousers, and he unzipped them with one quick yanking motion, and he wiggled Sanji’s pants and his boxer-briefs down a little further, bit by bit, just enough to pull his dick from where it’d been pressing hard against the crotch of his slacks.  

 

Zoro’s fingers curled around it, and when he glanced up, he saw Sanji, unmoving, still silent, with both his hands covering his face, his elbows sticking out in different directions.  

 

“Do you have a problem with this?” Zoro asked evenly, watching him.  

 

With his hands still over his face, Sanji slowly shook his head.  

 

“You wanna do this?” 

 

After a small pause, just a slowly, his blond hair rubbing against the countertop, he nodded.  

 

Zoro licked against the head of his cock, and he could hear Sanji’s sharp inhale, sucking air past his palms.  

 

Zoro went slow.As slow as he could.He trailed his lips along Sanji’s length, kissing and licking at him with deliberate and soft movements, squeezing his hand tight around the base of his dick, feeling Sanji throb against his palm every time his lips pressed and dragged against warm skin.  

 

And, as best as he could, he watched Sanji.  

 

Hands creeping upwards and past his forehead, Sanji pushed all the hair away from his face, and he clenched his hands shut, pulling on tight fistfuls of wavy blond locks.He blinked his eyes open and focused on the ceiling, his lips parted, breathing through his mouth now, trying to draw more air into his lungs.  

 

Zoro sucked the head of Sanji’s cock into his mouth, licking heavy against it, rolling his tongue, and when he glanced up at Sanji again, his voice slipped, got away from him as he exhaled, moaning a bit, and Sanji’s breath hitched when he heard it.  

 

Zoro’s hands roamed while he dipped his head lower, his eyes fluttering closed, still moving as slowly as he could, feeling the way Sanji started to shift and arch further under his fingertips when he ran them up and down his stomach, and his hips, and his thighs.Spreading long legs a little further apart until he was pulling against the trousers still gathered around his knees, Sanji’s heavy breathing filled Zoro’s ears, and his head, and everything.  

 

With languid movements, Zoro worked up and down Sanji’s cock, flattening and curling and pressing his tongue hard against throbbing, hot and wet flesh.And he chanced another glance upwards, Sanji having made nearly no sounds up to that point, and he blinked a couple times and realized his breath was stuck in his throat.  

 

He let Sanji’s cock slip from his mouth with a wet pop, and he straightened up, wrapping his fingers around Sanji’s dick.And he stood there, stroking Sanji, watching him openly.Staring at him.  

 

Sanji’s neck was craned back, one hand covering just his eyes, and the other was balled into a tight fist in front of his mouth.He was biting down hard on his knuckles, squirming with his thighs spread wide on the countertop, his shirt still bunched up around his collarbone.Breathing so damn heavily.  

 

The image burned into Zoro’s eyes, and Sanji pulled his hand from his mouth and said without looking at him, so very quietly, “Keep going.” 

 

Zoro, for the first time, obeyed him.  

 

He sucked harder, curling his lips inwards and closing his mouth tight around Sanji’s cock, pressing the tip of his tongue hard against Sanji’s length, flicking it back and forth as he moved forward and back, and Sanji finally, _finally_ , groaned something long and kind of loud, and his back arched so much.  

 

Zoro pulled back and licked all over him, he couldn’t fucking help it, dragging his tongue and sucking skin into his mouth along Sanji’s pelvis, and under his cock, burying his face between Sanji’s legs, and he bit his thighs, and Sanji caught himself from yelping when Zoro bit down harder.  

 

When he went back to his dick again, cheeks hollowing a bit around it, Zoro felt Sanji grab a rough handful of his hair and roll his hips upwards, and he pressed himself down the back of Zoro's throat.And Zoro wrapped his fingers around Sanji’s wrist, squeezing hard, his thumb pressing against Sanji’s palm as he bobbed up and down on his cock, and, he couldn’t _goddamn_ help it—he moaned around Sanji’s dick, because he was completely swept up, caught up in everything, and there was nothing else.  

 

“Hey.”

 

Zoro glanced up.  

 

“Can I come in your mouth,” Sanji breathed, his eyes closed and his voice uneven and thick as hell.Just above a whisper.“Please.” 

 

“Mhm.”

 

It didn’t take a lot after that.And when Sanji came, he pressed a hand over his mouth, muffling his own voice as he nearly shouted, his back curving so much, almost shaking.Zoro swallowed and stayed on him, still sucking, still licking, and when he finally pulled away from him, he watched Sanji laying there, slowly relaxing back against the counter/bar, hiding his eyes in the crook of his elbow, trying to catch his breath.  

 

Zoro was standing up straight again and taking a step back, wiping his mouth off with his hand, when Sanji took a deep breath through his nose and suddenly sat up straight.  

 

“Fuck!” 

 

He leapt off the counter, tripping up with his pants still around his thighs, and he hurried to pull them back up, and he threw open the oven.He pulled his shirt off and used it as an oven mitt, and he pulled out the cookies he’d made earlier and half-tossed them on top of the stove.  

 

Zoro walked over and stood next to Sanji as he surveyed his work.  

 

“Almost forgot about these fucking cookies.” 

 

They looked perfect.  

 

Zoro reached forward to grab one and Sanji smacked his hand.  

 

“ _Ow_ , dick—“ 

 

“No, you stupid idiot.First, they’re too goddamn hot, I pulled them out of the, uh... Fuck.Uh.Um... Oven.The oven—I pulled them from the oven literally two seconds ago.Also, I have to glaze them.” 

 

Zoro rolled his eyes.  

 

Sanji grabbed the second bowl he’d mixed ingredients into earlier, and Zoro watched him use the whisk from before to drizzle the glaze all over the cookies, and he stood back when he was finished, looking pleased while he admired his work, shirtless and skinny and drunk as fuck.  

 

“Alright.Um.” Sanji turned back towards Zoro, and the realization and recollection of what’d just passed between them bloomed all over his face.“Oh yeah.” 

 

Zoro said nothing, still watching him, and his dick was still pressed kind of fucking hard against the fabric of his pants, actually, and Sanji’s eyes shifted down, finally noticing it.  

 

There was no hesitation.Sanji stepped forward and grabbed the front of Zoro’s shirt, yanking him along, around the counter/bar and out towards the couch, and he used both hands to wrench him down onto the cushions, and he crawled on top of him.

 

“You don’t need to—“

 

“Ah, but I _want_ to,” Sanji cut him off.  

 

“How’re you even still conscious,” Zoro muttered.

 

“Beats me.” 

 

Sanji had Zoro’s pants off in a matter of a few maneuvers, and Zoro pulled his shirt off, and then he was kind of suddenly very naked, laying back on the couch, and Sanji’s mouth was all over him, hands rubbing against him, and Sanji knew what to do with a cock like he knew how to mix ingredients, and Zoro watched him, never looked away, and he could feel his own heartbeat in his ears.  

 

He was slipping.  

 

He hadn’t meant to do this.  

 

He hated Sanji.He couldn’t stand him, or the way he spoke, or the way he was good at cooking and business and, god damn it, sucking his dick.At everything he fucking did.  

 

And the way he moaned, the way his hands ran up Zoro’s stomach, up to his heaving chest, fingers stretching, blond hair falling over his face, shoulder-blades protruding out against his back when he moved his arms like that, god damn it—

 

Zoro wanted him.  

 

He didn’t need him, didn’t need him, didn’t need that piece of shit.But he wanted him.  

 

And that was his goddamn problem.And... Fuck.Probably that had always been his goddamn problem.

 

He’d watched Sanji drink his face off all night and never talk about it, never talk about why he ever did that sort of shit, never opening up to anyone or being fucking real or anything, always taking his dumbfuck emotions out on himself rather than anyone else, because that’s how he _was_ , and he lived for other people instead of himself, and Zoro hated that about him.  

 

Sanji would never open up, he’d never be real, and he wouldn’t ever tie himself to any one person because he belonged to fucking everyone.Zoro was one of many.  

 

And he hadn’t meant to do this.  

 

Sanji’s nose was pressed up against his pelvis, and Zoro ran his hand through blond hair as his roommate laid between his legs, weight on his elbows, his face wet and his eyes closed.  

 

When Zoro came, it was when Sanji looked up at him.  

 

And Sanji, without a word, pushed himself up onto his hands and knees, and he crawled up over Zoro and laid across his chest, elbows on either side of Zoro’s neck, burying his hands in Zoro’s hair, and he kissed him.  

 

Zoro hadn’t meant for this—this emotion, this crushing feeling, and the solidity of Sanji’s weight on him, pressing him down into the couch.He could feel Sanji’s fucking heart pounding out of his bare chest, right against his own, and Zoro didn’t know how to handle that.And.And he— 

 

Fuck.

 

He wrapped his arms tight around Sanji and kissed him hard, again and again, their lips pressingtogether in every way they could, and Sanji kissed against his jaw, and the corner of his mouth, and everywhere, and his breath was hot and smelled like cigarettes, and he pressed his lips firm against Zoro’s again, fingers raking through his hair, moving one hand to his throat, and Zoro felt Sanji’s breath, warm and almost gasping against his cheek.  

 

And after a moment, or maybe a while, Sanji pulled away and pushed himself up and away from Zoro, looking down at him, his lips parted just slightly, eyes searching all over his face.Like he was waiting for something.Looking for something.  

 

Zoro was stuck.He was lost, and he was trapped, and he’d never hesitated more in his life.  

 

And at that, Sanji rolled his eyes at him a little, and he fell down onto the couch, wedging himself between Zoro and the back cushion, throwing his arm loosely over Zoro's chest, and he used his other arm as a pillow and closed his eyes.  

 

Zoro slid out from under him and sat up after maybe a minute or two.Sanji was already asleep, passed out cold, shirtless with his work trousers barely still on his hips.Zoro stood up slowly and put his own clothes back on.And then he wandered over to the kitchen where Sanji’s cookies had cooled off.He put one in his mouth, and he scowled.  

 

They were fucking perfect.  

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey!!! THANKS FOR READING THE NEW CHAPTER!!!! we sincerely hope you liked it!! as always, we UGHHHH SO DEEPLY appreciate all reviews and reblogs and all that man. that means the world to us, especially now, after our hiatus. 2k15 has been a long year for us both. thanks for your patience dudes it means the world. also, here’s some additional facts about zoro and perona: 
> 
> \--perona was the first person to dye zoro's hair green in freshman year, and he kind of just kept doing it indefinitely after that
> 
> \--perona is the reason zoro knows 100% he is hella gay
> 
> \--zoro knows how to do 4 different types of braids and it's all perona's fault
> 
> \--perona gave zoro the shirt he wore to the christmas party
> 
> \--the clerks at blockbuster knew zoro and perona by name because they'd been in there and rented just about every single horror movie in stock
> 
> \--perona picked out shampoo and conditioner for zoro in high school that he still uses to this day
> 
> \--zoro can make 14 different types of milkshakes but he'll never tell anyone at the sunny and that is entirely perona's fault also
> 
> thanks again yall. you’re the best tbh honest
> 
> *** the name of the ship is kachop btw

**Author's Note:**

> !!! Thank you for reading !!!!


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